On The Move and Flying High

Jump off a mountain.

Gerry is on the move and flying high again.  The flying high, in this case, is a paraglide jump off the Matterhorn in Switzerland, complete with initial butterflies and then general whoops of pleasure and excitement at the ride. The little kid in him reminds me so much of another little kid I've loved (and was married to) and when I see him like this, I find my internal smile matching the one on my face.  I can't help the sentiment, not because he is supposedly a stud or a big movie star or a world traveler or any of the things that others look at him and see...but because I see the little kid in all of us, curious and going for all the thrills in life and not holding back on the response.

Gerry is a strange bird, but I can't for the life of me understand why people don't get him.  He's recently started smoking again and made an off handed comment that the stress made him do it.  Of course it did.  Anyone who has been a smoker (I have not) or has lived with one with the same temperament knows how it is.  "That temperament" is the operative word here.   One may not condone or sanction it, but perhaps one understands a little how the monkey on his back works...the seductress that lures you back to safety (or danger) in times of emotional stress.

Now what has Gerard Butler got to be stressed about?   Well, I can automatically see one very obvious thing that no one talks about...and that is the fact that he hasn't got many projects lined up (at least on paper).  Now whether that is due to his own personal choices or the fact that there are too many actors vying for the same roles and that perhaps he is not being offered them or not winning them, it is,  either way, a very big worry for a man who makes his living acting.  The fact that he (or Alan) is chasing promotional deals such as L'Oreal, etc. for him is very smart.  It keeps the money rolling in over the bumps in his career and keeps his face out there in a way they want it seen by the world.  And there are bumps.  Particularly for someone who doesn't want to be stuck being the action guy and all the aches and pains that come from stunts and training if that is the genre you are stuck in.  He has said he cannot go through the kind of training he did for 300 again.  It is one role he is being pursued for.  Wouldn't that be a stressor, choosing between your career and your health?

I think Gerry aspires to something more.  I think he knows his body can't take the punishment.  He is trying balance and balance comes hard to a "live wire" like he is...but he really does push to do it, and I admire that.  Balance is important.  In everything.  People think he just plays at it, but I am not one of those.  I think he really knows he needs it and goes after it.  Whether he is always successful is another matter.

I think the second thing that MIGHT be bothering him (it would bother me, so that is why I mention it), is that the movies he does have in the can, he is nervous about the expectations that have been put out there.  I think this is especially true of Machine Gun Preacher.  It has been said that he may have given an award worthy performance in this role and that is the reason it is being released in time for award consideration.  This  was originally put out there by a blogger.  Whether true or not (and it probably is), I have heard there are very good performances in this movie, other than his own.  Could those other performances be the partial reason for the director wanting the movie released for consideration?

Too high an expectation for the guy who did The Bounty Hunter?

Loving surfing?

To my way of thinking, it is always better to be surprised then to go in having too high an expectation and too many of his eager fans have taken up the clarion call without seeing the movie.  Perhaps that is adding to the pressure cooker he may find himself in?

He needs for his next few movies to do well so that he will be considered for the roles he wants to do.  In typically Gerry fashion, he is out there prepping for Mavericks so that he will look authentic on the surf board.  Hopefully he is enjoying the sport and having fun doing it for its own sake.  I'm not sure why he is being criticized for that fun by those who can never find anything redeeming in anything he does.

Now,  understanding why he is smoking again doesn't mean I think it's a good idea.  On the contrary! But I am not going to sit here and rag on him.  Well, only a little,  then.  He has made a choice to smoke.   He has to make another choice to quit again.

I've seen the result of that addiction first hand and suffered along with the person going through it.  It's not pretty.  It is a killer of many things....not only of the body it eventually destroys, but of passion and spontaneity, of the toll your choice takes on your relationships in the "he knows I hate it but he doesn't love me or care enough about how it affects our intimacy to stop" kind of thing.

When my husband got his diagnosis, it came as a complete shock to him.   Gastric-esophageal cancer hiding (and by that time too far along) in a hiatus hernia.   His lungs were fine, but that constant drip of poison had relaxed and worn the ring that separates stomach from esophagus and had been causing constant reflux.   He joined my next door neighbor, who had been diagnosed with primary liver cancer (directly related to smoking done many years before), in the fraternal order of cancer victims.  Which of them was going to succumb first?

That is where some choices lead.  How they both wished they had made different choices.  They were still in their prime...barely 50 and 53 respectively, ...both tall, slim and lovely still.  And quickly prematurely old and too quickly dead.

I had stopped the nagging the last time he started again, but had warned if he got cancer related to his smoking I would not take care of him.  But of course I did.  He stopped smoking for the final time ... too late and such a fucking waste!   His guilt and lament in leaving me and our "just out of college" daughter, was palpable and weighed heavily on him.  He worried so much about the portion of her that was so like him and thankful for the part that was like me.  When I see her stressed and struggling with things a lot like he did, I thank God she never smoked and has no desire to.

Thanks to his smoking, the stressed little boy with the self destructive bent had finally killed the man who was trying to live up to the world's expectations of what a man should be and who kept trying to find the joy in it all.

When I see someone like Gerry going through some of the same things, I feel sad and know there is not a damned thing to be done about it...not even by the people he loves or who love him.   It is a choice he makes and we live and we die by our choices.

I hope he has much success with Coriolanus, Machine Gun Preacher, Playing the Field and the others, and that he gets the things he wants out of life.  I hope they are enough to make him realize that he doesn't need a crutch to get him through and that turning to the smokes will only drive people who might love him away, rather than bring them closer.  Some smokers never get that... They are too intent on that next nicotine hit and that becomes all that matters.

I'll close with my usual bit of advise.   "Keep flying high baby, but try doing it without the smokes!  That crutch will eventually kill you and that would make a lot of people very sad indeed."

Those are also my last words on the matter.  I am not his conscience, nor his parent.  I just happen to have a soft spot somewhere in me for confused little boys who live in their heads and are trying to get down into their bodies in whatever way they can.

Having said that, it just occurred to me that that perhaps explains a lot about his love life and his physical fixations?

Now I'm smiling and shaking my head.  That darned catch 22 again!

Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate


Just a short note to again state that these are my speculative thoughts and not to be taken as gospel regarding anything Gerry might really be going through.  

Happy Independence Day from Gerry...

...to the paparazzi.   It may look like a thumbs up, but more reminiscent of his shooting a bow and arrow in one of his movies and what immediately came to mind when I looked at this photograph a few minutes ago.  One right through the heart (or in the ass).   I hope it was the latter.  Love ye kid!

Hope he and his friends and all of his fans celebrated a lovely 4th of July.

Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate

...and still we do it.

*"When we press the thorn to our breast, we know ...we know...and still we do it."

Interesting Reading:

http://www.simplyantiaging.com/36/why-celebrities-smoke-or-the-sunset-boulevard-syndrome/

http://www.medicinenet.com/smoking_effects_pictures_slideshow/article.htm

Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate

Gerry Photo Courtesy of Just Jared


*The moment I saw this photograph, this line from THE THORN BIRDS started going round and round in my head.  


My late husband  was just like Gerry.  He would stop, cold turkey, for years at a time and then start up again.   He went from being a healthy 6 footer one minute,  to a shadow of his former self the next....nine months from diagnosis to extinction.

Not all the pleasure of smoking was worth the pain he went through.

Is Gerard Butler's Sex Life Really Terrible?

This is the question that is making the rounds of the gossip sites that thrive on celebrity, after a paparazzi jokingly asked Butler this question as he was getting into a car to depart a charity function the other night.  The actor replied in his typical, playful fashion that it was "terrible."

The lovely enigma.

The one problem with quoting Butler lies in the fact that he often answers these types of questions in an ironic fashion and too many people cannot tell when he is being ironic or not and take him at his word.  As usual, it gets repeated by 50 different websites and joins the other 5,000 "not necessarily true," bits of information chronicled on this actor and becomes part of his "unofficial biography" that people spout as gospel when talking about him.

Of  course this statement runs contrary to Butler's reputation as a man who will hit on or sleep with any good looking female that crosses his path and which propensity has even earned him his own little jingle courtesy of TMZ, which coined the term being "Butlered" to indicate a woman has been inducted into a certain club or group of females.

The problem with all this is that no one is really sure what "being Butlered" really means or whether it is a club that any one really wants to belong to, and therein lies the two edged sword for Gerard Butler and may put a crimp in his love life or the persona he has earned and/or created and one the press has nurtured.

There  are many things that can be said about Gerry, but most that have observed him would agree that  he is a theatrical person.  He never does anything small...his gestures are large and his effusiveness and approach to living are equally capable of attracting attention the minute he walks into a room.   It doesn't help that those qualities are contained and wrapped in a nice looking package and augmented by a loud, boyish playfulness and mischief, spiced with a certain self deprecating irony, that can sometimes be irresistible  to those who lack some of these qualities and at the same time, quite open to misinterpretation by those not familiar with the dichotomy he represents.

This is borne out by the equal amount of people who think he is either a boastful simpleton or a very complicated person.   Or even by the division of whether he really does have a long list of willing bed partners or it is, in fact, all an act and he is really incapable of having any kind of relationship with a female because he is either only capable of "loving himself" or a closeted gay.  The gay myth is further perpetuated by the fact that he is such a player and has had few visible stable relationships...ie...therefore he must be gay.

While I won't opine on the subject because it would all simply BE speculation, it is difficult not to comment on the fact that while he may love having the reputation of being  a ladies man and may merit it simply on the premise that he "loves" the ladies and naturally gravitates to them when entering any situation,  there are very few women with any kind of self esteem/love of self that would want to belong to a club where it is implied that one has been charmed, bedded, and become a member in good standing of a club that simply equals being "one more notch" in a player's belt.

While many women would be flattered to attract the attention of a man like Gerry and would love being in his orbit or have him be a part of theirs,  for all the qualities that make him attractive, there are few, with any brains,  who want to be known as one who simply served as a vessel for an over hyped sex drive for the night and most likely the reason we never really hear from any of his real conquests.

On the other hand, does "being Butlerd" simply mean one has been the object of his attention with little more to it than that (and that he keeps his real affections "sub rosa")?   Or does it really matter if this is all it is, when, according to the gossips, the real perception will be that you somehow "hooked up" with him after falling victim to his charm?

Sole or soul surfer?

Like everything in life this kind of thing carries an automatic Catch 22, where perception and reality are interchangeable and truth has little to do with either.

Again, what girl would want to be the subject of that kind of speculation?  And could that kind of publicity really be the cause of a "sex" life that wasn't all that it appeared to be?  Or could it be that the quality of that sex life was lacking simply because, past the one night stand, there was too little interest from either party to further it into something a little more interesting?

Butlered?  Is it only a cute little gimmick cooked up for entertainment purposes by TMZ  based on Butler's attraction for the ladies who show up in droves whenever he is around.  Or could it be that, though he perpetuates the myth by his actions, it becomes a case of where the perception works against him, instead of making him more desirable to the ones that would be worth a second look?

I suppose I am commenting on this because I am curious how it would feel to be the object of attention for the night from a man (any man) you really fancied and then have him move on like you were nothing more than a night's entertainment, unless that is what you fancied too!  Does being forearmed with that knowledge help?  Free will plays into it too and if, as a liberated female this is okay with you and the same thing you craved, then why not?  At least it's honest and honesty is a good thing.

I've never been that to a man, so I don't honestly know.   I have never felt "used" nor victim nor had any desire to exploit someone for the same reason.  I never see myself as anyone's victim.  It's just not me.

This brings to mind an incident the other night.  I heard some girls talking about the men they were with in a restaurant bathroom at a trendy Hollywood steak house a few nights ago that made my toes curl.  These were model types (at least one of them was) and they were talking about some high visibility athletes they dated.  It wasn't pretty guys.

These girls didn't sound like victims to me.  Is this turnabout fair play or did I just find them disgusting because of the language they were using to refer to the guys.  They were just pieces of meat and dollar signs to these girls.  There was not a note of admiration or affection to be found between them.  Is this what celebs of any stripe have to contend with today?  It made me wonder.  

It reminded me that I was once the object of affection of a very high profile athlete years ago, but the thought of exploiting him for his fame would be the furthest thing from my mind.  Besides, he was married at the time and that was a place I wouldn't even go, as flattered as I was by his attentions.

He's still around and placed up high in management in the world he inhabits.  I wonder if he'd remember me if he saw me again today?

According to some of Gerard Butler's  fans, NO women in her right mind would turn him down, right?  That thinking always makes me laugh.  I've turned down a man I fancied for exactly that reason.  I need to be more than that and men instinctively know it.  Only the fearless near tread that ground. I don't need commitment.  I want to hold a man by his need of me, not by any man made bonds.  He comes back because he simply "has to."  Lucky for me, the ones that mattered did just that .  Even the player.  Especially the player. In the five years we were lovers,  I can honestly say he never cheated on me. Hopefully he was too exhausted and too in love (like me) to do it.  That he still stayed in touch for so many years after I was married (so was he) was a testament to how deep our feelings went and how much we liked each other.

Last year I met a man who was a motivator and also did astrology readings for fun and profit.  He was very flirty and lavishing with his praises, saying he could read me.   Then he got more serious and said to me..."I am so tempted, but I already know you would hurt me.  You are too much for me and only a fool would go there knowing it."  And he still asked me out.

I didn't need him to stroke my vanity.   He was lovely, but you know what you like and he wasn't it....though his honesty was terribly attractive.  If I think I will hurt someone, I won't go there.  Again, I didn't.

Men are not stupid, except when it comes to being led around by their anatomy, as evidenced by too many in the news today.!   They may be players and love too many women to settle for just one and I applaud the ones that recognize it and stay single because of it.

But most humans gravitate towards the comfort of one partner at a time and recognize the ones that can fill them up in more ways then one and keep them coming back because there is an art to love and to sex and you have to really like it and not just pretend to.   And they have to know that you don't have a false sense of self worth, but that you really like yourself because you will be true to who you are and know that giving up who you are for someone or expecting them to do the same for you, is a recipe for disaster because you are giving up the very thing they like about you and you like about them in the first place.

One does not become the missing half of the other person (like a lot of romance novelists like to say and too many people believe), but one remains the enhancing whole person (good and bad) that brings a different kind of excitement to the other person's life.  That is where the "opposites" attract thing comes from in the first place.  My first serious bit of writing years ago was centered around that whole premise.

I always love to say that women have never met a man they didn't want to change...and there is so much truth to that.  Men do the same thing, but perhaps not to the same degree.

My niece is going away to college and my daughter wanted to give her the book "Why Men Love Bitches."   I haven't read it, but after she told me the gist of it,  I told her I thought the only thing wrong with that book was the title.  It implies that because you are a smart woman and refuse to be anyone's doormat, that you have to automatically be "a bitch.   That's fine if you like to be equated with a "dog."

On the contrary,  you simply have to be happy to be female and all the things that the word should imply...someone smart and joyous, with a career or not, but capable of  intelligently rearing a child into adulthood (if that is a choice you make), and even nurturing the child in the grown up man that you choose as a partner and helping him to grow in other ways, instead of trying to destroy that part of him that attracted you in the first place.  A person that can't be himself or herself, is an unhappy person.

And that brings me back to Gerry's sex life.  Is it really terrible?

Was it irony in play in the offhand comment or is there some candid truth to his answer?  Is the criteria that constitutes the healthiness of his sex life determined by the quality or quantity of his partners?

If the gossips are to believed, it is the latter.  Could it be that despite what he appears to be or says, he longs for the former?   Or is that just wishful, female thinking again?

Or could it be he just loves the attention and the speculation that makes him mysterious enigma?  After all, Hollywood and the movies is all about smoke and mirrors.  Is this a case of "where there is smoke there is fire" or a case where the smoke obscures the fire?

For a fellow that shares so much of himself in candid interviews and the reason so many of his fans feel close to him, it is the reason he is just what he seems one minute and then the next minute, not what he seems at all.

For those of us following his career, for whatever reason, he remains in turn, funny, endearing, theatrical, ironic, sarcastic, a lover of women, a lover of his male buddies, a little top that just keeps on turning and turning, a curious of everything and everyone person, an addictive and addicted, successful, hardworking little boy in a grown body and, most of the time, a very sexy, sometimes clutzy, but mostly attractive person with some still untapped talent that keeps people guessing as to whether he is, in fact, what he appears to be or something altogether different...and perhaps part of the reason so many keep watching.

Now whether all those things are enough to fill him up and make him happy is another question only he can answer.  For his sake, I hope the answer is yes.  Or do I?

Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate


*Reading this over, my pompous ability to ramble on and be enamored with my own opinion never ceases to amaze me sometimes.  Perhaps I have that in common with Gerry and the reason I relate.  My friends tell me I am a good listener, but you wouldn't know it by my lack of brevity.


What an ass I am...and still I ramble on.  Oh well, I did warn you.  "Songs out of tune...etc..." doesn't just apply to this muse. 

Gerry Butler Nominated for Scottish Fashion Award?

N

Sexy looking devil?

Although Gerard Butler has been looking very well attired and groomed in several recent photos, it always tickles my funny bone to learn that my favorite sartorially challenged Scot is competing for this award.  A man of extremes in many ways, he looks stunningly handsome one minute and "little boy playing in the mud" the next.

I am not complaining, mind you....it is one of the refreshing things about him, that male normalcy that he is living his life as much on his own terms as being a Hollywood star/actor allows him.

I do have to confess to liking his hair the longer lengths instead of the short, Napoleon like crop of the past, and Gerry is one man who actually looks good with facial hair.  It softens him (not in an unmasculine way) and makes him.....(I always search for the right word here...it is a feeling more than just a look) "more accessible," more "in touch" with the historical,  more "European,"  just more "him."   Perhaps it just gives his face more character?

Surfer bum in Hawaii

He looks well clean shaven, but I've gotten so used to him with the facial hair that it's like he is a comfortable pair of soft, buttery leather shoes or a very soft tee you always want to wear...and he always looks more good humored with the scruff or even with the fuller beard.

A lot of people wouldn't agree with me, but I don't look back at yesterday's Gerry as being better looking.  Age has added some character to his face and I see him as more him now...someone who is more able to laugh at life  and himself then before.

Where so many of his early photos were posed shots intended to make him sexy and alluring to sell to the public,  he is now more naturally sexy, despite the lines and more weathered skin, especially when he is not posing and when there is a smile in his eyes as well as his mouth and his sense of humor is peeking through.

Gerry with Leo DiCaprio

Now, after having said that, I must admit that Gerry looks wonderful in a well fitting suit and he is a little more conscious of what looks good on him lately.  He is also coming across as more relaxed in a suit as a second skin than before.

He is very fit and looks healthy these days, a nice glow to his eyes and skin.  He has gone lighter with the hair, perhaps for the "sun kissed" look of the outdoorsman roles of a soccer player and the upcoming role as a surfer, but also perhaps because it is easier maintenance with the large amount of white in his hair these days.

Diamond in the rough.

Either way, I suppose it is a testament to his popularity with the ladies that he is nominated for this award each year.  But,  if I had a choice between the polished and the diamond in the rough Gerry, well,  I'll take the comfortable one with the real smile on his face over the "for public consumption Gerry, every single time.

Good luck with the award, man, but if it doesn't happen, it is one award it's okay to go without.  It's not really you, unless fashion icon means that "hobo chic" (as some have called your style at times)....is very in and a sure sign of a "real" icon, fashionable or not!   After all, how many men can get away with wearing a leather diaper and manage not to look totally absurd?

Postscript: 3-14-11 

CASE IN POINT?

Rating the Outfit

Bike helmet = Good!
Blue Jacket = Good!
Appropriate Shoes = Good!
Green Eyes =  More than good!
Ugly red pants =  He wanted to make sure the cars saw him coming a mile away?

GB looking fine (despite the pants) and staying fit!

Ye gotta love this man!

Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate


*Biking  photo courtesy of Just Jared.

Prepping for Mavericks?

As I knew he would be, once his filming was finished for Playing the Field,  Gerard Butler was back in Hawaii to continue surfing lessons for his upcoming role in Mavericks.  Looking as trim as he was in Timeline, the Scot is hard at work and probably having fun as well.














Love the look he gave the photographer here.  Let's use some of that smolder in your movies G!


There were also photos of him with his Playing the Field co-star Jessica Biel, riding the Harley on the Malibu coast this weekend.  They look good together, but as one source said, Gerry's "got a large personality" and I do think most people like being around someone with a "lust for life."  Their reps say they are just friends.

Whatever the case, I wish them luck, both privately and professionally.  These are two nice people and I hope Playing the Field reflects the fun and enthusiasm that all the photos coming out of the shoot displayed.

I was happy to see Biel cast in the role of the wife because I felt these two might have some onscreen chemistry and I am still hoping I was right.

Is that chemistry there offscreen?   Only time will tell, but either way, good friendships are nice too, so we'll see.

I am sure the cynics will have them together only to promote their movie or some other stupid reason, and that is always a possibility, but I have a feeling these are two people tired of playing the game and maybe just enjoying each other's company.


Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate

Photos courtesy of JJ, TMZ and Gals.

Looking Trim, Toned and Happy...

Good buddy and some outside help.

... despite life's small inconveniences.


Filming finished, some free time, the green outdoors and a good buddy to share it with?  Life is good for Gerard Butler.

Can you say Road Trip?

Trim and Toned

Songs out of tune, the words always a little wrong...Canzoni Stonate