Making art is a beautiful thing; at times it can allow you to say or do the things you couldn't bring yourself to do in real life. With RIP LOVE, I was finally able to live out the fantasy of my own confession of love. I could finally say all the things I thought all day and all night, pictured until hit with a chilling migraine, and desired so deeply I felt as though I could combust.
When I made the film and pretended to tell the one I love how I feel while looking into the eyes of one actor who was by all means a stranger, it only made me feel more for him. The less I saw him, the more I indulged in fantasizing about the idea of him. Finally though, I told myself I could no longer love someone inside my head and inside my head only, supported by very little hard evidence that I even jelled with him in the flesh.
I hadn't seen him in months when he came over, and in the time we were apart, my infatuation bloomed into love, and love into a small obsession. I never have a crush on anyone, so when I do, I harness the affection of years of loving onto one person. (Hard to imagine why things don't work out...)
I only saw him for about an hour and in that hour I realized -- nobody had ever been so wrong for me. He didn't listen when I spoke, he didn't open up to me, and he genuinely had no interest in me, not only on a romantic level, but in general, as a human being. Nobody had ever treated me so poorly in such a subtle way before. Explaining the horror of the interaction was like one of those times when you say something like "Everyone has those dogs." And your friend says, "Who has a Dachshund, I bet you can't name one person." And even though you totally do know thousands of people who have Dachshunds, in that moment, its like that breed doesn't even exist. The evidence had escaped me, and I couldn't seem to prove I was right.
The second he left, I knew I wouldn't see him for a very long time -- which also meant that in his absence I had to be very careful not to put him back up on that pedestal where he most certainly did not belong. Since the premiere of the film, I no longer ache for him like before; I finally seemed to have purged him. When I lay in bed at night in between dreams, I never know what to think about if not him. I close my eyes now and all I see is black -- but who's to say that's better?