Little Manhattan

I watched one of the cutest movies ever over the last couple days (I haven’t really had a lot of free time lately, so I tend watch things in installments). The movie is called Little Manhattan, and it’s about Gabe and Rosemary, two 11-year-olds from New York who fall in love one summer, before Rosemary leaves to go to summer camp, then off to private school. Throughout the movie, one of the back stories is that Gabe’s parents have been in the middle of a divorce for more than a year (but are still living together for some odd reason), and Gabe’s mom has started to date again. As a side note, I can imagine it’d be really weird for her dates to have her husband greet them at the door. [WARNING: Spoiler alert. I highly recommend watching the movie before reading this post. I’m planning on buying it, so you could wait ’til then to borrow it from me, or you can also watch it here.]

Anyway, the movie taught me something about love that I didn’t realize, until my friend pointed it out to me. At one point, Gabe says something to Rosemary he doesn’t mean, and ends up miserable because of it. To stop the pain, he then convinces himself that he doesn’t care about her anymore. The next day he’s talking to his dad about love:

Gabe: Dad, what's the deal with girls? I mean, why are they the way they are?
Dad: You're talking to the wrong man.
Gabe: Well, how come all love has to end?
Dad: Let me tell you something about me and your mom. Once upon a time, we really loved each other, but as time went by, there just got to be all these things, little things, stupid things, that were left unsaid. And all these things that were left unsaid piled up, like the clutter in our storage room. And after awhile, there was so much that was left unsaid, that we barely said anything at all.
Gabe: Well, why didn't you just say them then, dad?
Dad: I don't know, Gabe. I kind of wish I had.

Because of that conversation, Gabe has a revelation that he still liked Rosemary – but more than that, he loved her. And he knew he had to tell her he didn’t mean what he’d said before. “I couldn't escape them, all the little things I left unsaid – I was drowning in them.” So he does – he risks everything (emotionally) to tell her that he loves her. Which quite naturally leaves her in shock. She is only eleven, after all.

Gabe: You think you might wanna love me, too?
Rosemary: I don't know what I think, Gabe, I'm only 11. I don't think I'm ready to be in love…but I'm really happy you came.

That, “but I’m really happy you came,” made putting his heart out there worth it. And even though they had to go their separate ways, something good came out of his experience. When Gabe came home after that talk with Rosemary, he found his parents laughing and talking together. When his mom left the room, his dad bent down and said to him, “I just cleared some old stuff out of the storage room.”

"Love is an ugly, terrible business, practiced by fools. It'll trample your heart and leave you bleeding on the floor. And what does it really get you in the end? Nothing…but a few incredible memories that you can't ever shake."

What my friend helped me realize is this. Even knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t have traded the experiences I gained in my last year and a half for anything, because it made me who I am now.