Bruno

Discussion (4) ¬

1. 
   ronald

   April 11, 2019 at 9:26 am | #

   Okay, so, the fact that Bruno “left” Gina implies that they were at one point “together,” right? That must have been in some of the strips that for whatever reason weren’t “reprinted” this time around.

   Unless simply living with Gina rent-free counted as “together.”
2. 
   Christopher

   April 11, 2019 at 11:23 am | #

   Well, there was always the tension of a relationship, and a big part of their situation was navigating what they wanted out of their connection. I think “left” is a fair term, but perhaps more left a “situation” than a “full relationship.”

   And there were a LOT of feelings between the two, I think “simply living with Gina rent-free” is a tad simplistic.
3. 
   ronald

   April 11, 2019 at 6:39 pm | #

   My apologies, but I clearly didn’t receive everything that you were conveying. :-|

   Although, again, I think the Fast Forward past the circumstances during which Bruno left Gina’s city and returned to Dije’s city skipped some relevant material.
4. 
   Peter Rogan

   April 11, 2019 at 6:46 pm | #

   Gina, by force of example alone, showed Bruno a better way of life — one that she herself had to agree with. But it included change, and the implication of continued change, with an unknown outcome. That Bruno recognized this as progress did not change the fact that she felt trapped, being dragged into a future she wasn’t prepared for — a future of changes she could not know would be what she wanted, but would be other than what she had come to expect. So she rabbited, right back to her formerly flighty if preternaturally self-aware ways, abandoning career in favor of careen.

   This is a depressive cycle. A very dangerous one. People afraid of beneficial change, because it changes them, panic and run. When for one reason or another they can’t run, or hide, or disappear, or have a psychotic break and end up in a fetal position in a closet, they show a decided preference for suicide. Better to leave everything than face the fear and uncertainty of change — paradoxically, change that makes them feel better. Because how are they going to come to think about how they were? Will they become lost in remembering their own misery, and circle the drain that way? Or will they just stumble back into the same old self-defeating pattern, with the booze, the drugs, the one-night stands, proving improvement was a lie? And that pretending they could break out of the ultimate lie, one they can’t bear the thought of surviving, enervates them completely.

   The ultimate tragedy is that such people may think their own self-propelled descent is proof of their own unworthiness and, worst, their own ability to improve thanks to (a deserved?) urge to self-destruction. And so they circle that drain, orbiting between the transient pleasure of the moment and ultimate existential despair that this is the only life they know or can stand. You can only circle the drain so many times before you either go down the tubes or lie weak and spent on the bottom, unable or powerless to reach the drain or to get up and find a new one.

   I have to wonder how many times you can watch yourself do this before you decide it’s not worth it, not worth it at all, stop eating and just face the wall. And wait for the end. How many times can Bruno repeat the same futile cycle before she gets too bored of it to go on? And what then? In the end, what then? Because nothing really ends.