ownly notes

(opening to ownly has dion mcgregor dreams again a city so nice with slithering shots of the city)

('what a woman' by Dion Mcgregor plays) while credits are rolling at the start of the film.
 Charlotte wakes up in her bed and there is her boyfriend next to her.
C- 'What are you dreaming about'
D- 'Huh?'
C- 'You were talking in your sleep again.'
D- 'I don't really remember, something about tits.'
C- 'Yeah, you said big milky tits.'
D- 'Did I?'
C- 'Yeah, you did.'
D- 'Well, I guess I was dreaming about milky tits, good night.'

The title 'OWNLY' comes up in crappy type.
Back to Charlotte and David in bed talking nose to nose.

C- 'When you go to sleep, you're alone,  when you wake up, you're alone.  When you die, you suffer out of life, alone.  You are so alone right now looking at me.  When I say I love you, I am just saying that I love my vision in you, I love the thing in you that I already am mixed with what I desire to become.  I am searching identity like a heat seeking missile (beep, beep, beep).   Don't you understand? (she tries it out) I love you, (she shakes her head) what the fuck.

D- You are such a queen.  I love you too.  And not even because I love myself so much, it's more like a good novel, I smile and I cry, my cheeks hurt from laughing, and I hate you and feel embarrassed that you can do that to me, you make me feel manipulated and embarassed.  And you make me feel like I have a great purpose, I say things to you and you understand me more than most people in the world.  That is a treasure bigger than anything, it is probably the only thing that we truly own. 

C- But I don't own you.

D- Nope, and I don't own you.

C- Deal.

D- Deal.

C- You are probably going to leave me when you find the right man?

D- Probably, I mean, that would make sense.  But I will always be aware of how I feel now, I can't explain sexuality, but I assume someday, yeah, I'll be with a man.  I would do anything for you though, willingly, honestly.

C-  Because I don't own you?

D- I don't even own me, we are all owned by each other.  I am the sum of all my relationships, not just you, but my relationship to everything.  And I am deeply vulnerable to how you feel about me, I want to love you without fear.

C-  That's impossible.

D-  No it's not, you just say shit like that to guard yourself, but it hurts me. 

C-  I'm sorry.

D- No I'm sorry, I should have said something earlier.

C- Why is love like a bruise?

D- Like a tender-happy bruise?

C-  It feels like mushy-terrible-delight.

D- (laughs)

They sit silently for a while, the conversation has turned into a tense pause in expectation of its next step.  David lifts Charlotte's hand and kisses the back of it, then he turns it over to the palm and kisses that, he folds her fingers around the residue of his kiss and gives it to her.  He changes the subject.

D-  Where is Bau-bau's cage?

C-  I took him to the vet in it. 

D-  In your truck?

C- Yeah.

D-  Have they told you what is wrong with him yet?

C- No.  I don't know if snakes can catch human sicknesses, you know he was sleeping in bed with me when you weren't here, so maybe he caught a cold I was carrying or something.

D- Yeah, I don't think it's healthy for a snake to lie in bed with you like that.

C-  He seemed okay with it, that cage is too small for him anyway.

D- Well, I guess you'll see what the vet says.  Did you tell him that Bau-Bau was sleeping with you.

C- Of course, I told him everything, I made a checklist in my mind and I went down the list when I talked to him and made sure I told him everything that I could think about.  I mentioned how I let him loose in my room most of the time and I told him that I clean the room to make sure it's safe for him but maybe I forgot something, like a chocolate muffin, and it made him sick because maybe snakes are like dogs about the chocolate thing.  I also told him that I go to SUNY and that people come over all the time and touch him, so maybe somebody gave him something, I don't know.  He said that he is going to monitor him for the next couple of days to see if he can get him to start eating again, which is fine because I asked mom to help me pay for the whole thing, and she said yes, she is giving it to me as part of my 'Christmas present', so that's good.

D-  Your mom is supper nice, she always helps you out.

C-  I know, I would be totally fucking lost without her.

D-  I think she enjoys helping you.

C-  I still feel guilty about it.

D-  But she loves you and she is supper proud of you.

C-  I love her too, she is an amazing person.

D-  That snake food smells like shit.

C-  I know. 

D- How long did you notice Bau-Bau sleeping like that?

C- For a couple of weeks, I just, I don't know, I thought that he would get over it and then he didn't. 

D- Huh.

C-  Yeah.

D-  We'll I don't know, I hope he gets over it.

C-  I hope so too, he lost a lot of weight.

D-  Really?

C-  Yeah, I probably waited too long, I just kept thinking that he was going to get better.

D-  Would you put him down if he gets too sick?

C-  I doubt it, I mean if it got really bad I would, I guess, I just feel like most things cling to life.  This whole putting down an animal things wigs me because I would not want someone else saying that they are doing what is best for me, putting me out like that, without a consultation.  I mean, if it is really bad, really really bad, yes, of course, we all hit a point where enough is enough, but I would rather get him some snake morphine or something and let him go slowly.  I really hate having so much power over him without anyway of knowing if what I am doing is what he would want or not.  I mean he's hard to read, harder than a cat, and it is kind of strange that my time is shared in equal proportion to his time, you know, it's fucking strange that I share my human life with another species.  I kind of pick up how he thinks sometimes, but his consciousness is behind a door.  So I feel really weird about the vet, which is probably why I took my time taking him there in the first place.  I want to do what is best for him, so in that way it is easy, but he probably hates being dominated like that.  I just wish I knew what he thought.

D-  It would be really cool to be a wizard and get to think like other animals when you wanted to.

C-  I know, I would want to be able to move like an animal if I could.  Have the muscular ability of a panther, oh my God that would be so amazing.

D- I would want to be an owl, have really good night vision, be so still and strong.

C-  That would be amazing.  To just be, not be like, but be an animal for a minute and then get to return to being me and know a little bit about them.

D-  But then we would get caught up in their dramas, which would not be that big of a deal, but we would not get our work done as fast because we would be mindful of not upsetting the ways of the birds.

C-  I don't know, that sounds pretty amazing to me.


 -Charlotte is being stalked by the snake, she is constantly aware that there is something looming over her. 
-Then she finds out that the snake was trying to eat her.  She kills the snake and transforms the role of pray into predator, in this quick role reversal she becomes the snake, coping with her confusion and in a sense praying on herself.
-In the end she is dropped off into the Garden of Eden, the quad in the center of the school, where she recounts that there is more to life than the rules of our habits and morality and sometimes we are forced to be terrible things that we have already written off, she recognizes the endless possibilities that play on each of us.  She accepts the ugliness inside her own choices as something that is repulsive but acceptable. 

Maybe each section can have a title and the title of the film can be a collection of the titles,
'O.S.P.'
'Ownly, S-talking and Pr(e)(a)ying'.