It Was Real For Me
Soliloquies Of What Almost Was
I tried to write this post about a movie but it turns out the movie wasn’t that interesting—except for one key scene and the meaning it imparted. X-Men Wolverine: Origins is that of which I speak. Logan is one of my favorite characters, and not just for the talented actor or the cool healing powers, but for the deep mythic meaning.
He’s a survivor, a warrior, but not a 1-dimensional cliche. He’s a reluctant messiah and an enigma who finds his own way to heroism when it counts.
In the pivotal scene, the villain began describing his treacherous plan: how Logan’s girlfriend’s death was faked, and how she was in on the ruse. And how their relationship was never real.
Logan didn’t flinch. He replied, ‘It Was Real for Me.’ I paused and let the moment sink in. I had seen the movie 5 times but I never caught that meaning, that scene, and that sureness. There’s exposition that would put you, the reader, there—the stakes, the nuance and the layers. But it doesn’t matter, really.
What matters is that Logan honored this moment and this love any way. By doing so, he served as a stand-in for us, for what we can be when we look inward for guidance. He had all the tools to be a mercenary—cold, calculated, impenetrable and stoic. But he chose vulnerability and risked everything to love any way. In so doing, he inverts and controverts all the bogus themes of men (and people) protecting themselves instead of opening to life and seeing love as a zero-sum-game.
A pitched battle between seemingly natural adversaries, vying for control. A chess match but with real stakes. A sad and unnecessary zeitgeist that decimates our culture and civilization.
Logan didn’t need to win. He needed to be authentic. He knew that we gain nothing when we risk nothing. He knew that vulnerability was real strength, despite what the culture hawks on social media. Despite what everyone was doing around him. Despite the pain and disillusionment of betrayal and loss. He didn’t let these events make him cynical.
When he loved, it was real, even if the other person couldn’t meet him there. Even if he looked like a fool. Because it was real for him. Because he was real. His love was real. Because vulnerability is not weakness, it’s the opposite. It’s strength. We risk pain and loss in the quest to meet the other in the hallowed space of intimacy.
Our culture wants to sell us fantasies of control, stoicism and power moves. But Logan was at peace with being fooled. Because always operating from a position of advantage means never risking and never truly living. Only when we risk loss, failure, and blame, do we live.
As manly as Logan looks and often acts in these movies, it’s his sensitivity in this scene that makes him Logan and not some caricature of manliness from some collective fever-dream. He has a heart and it can be broken. Otherwise, it’s not a heart, but a wall that isolates and stagnates our energy.
Love is not a game. It’s not a competition. Love asks us to strip off our armor, to lay down our weapons. To soften and to view the other with the eyes of empathy. To humanize and forgive the limitations of our partners. Love is not at war. Even when we lose.