Perceiving more the second time.

I saw Platoon on a movie channel yesterday. This movie about Vietnam, war and how people deal with it had a surprise for me. At various stages of the movie (before and after advertisements) the channel gave little tit-bits about Platoon. So besides the fact that the entire crew lived like soldiers at location in the Philippines, I also learned that this was one of Johnny Depp’s first movies, and that Stone saw Depp becoming a Hollywood star.

What is quite surprising was not Stone’s ability to sniff out star material but that there was something new to be found in the old. I have seen Platoon many times and I have never recognised Depp nor seen Depp’s name in the fine print of the credits.

I remember, many years back, my father asking me whether I could hear new nuances to familiar music, then I heard music as one great orgiastic human creation. The delicacy of the cymbals in the clash of drums, the off-beat or even the sound of an altogether new instrument was lost in the noise of music.

And this ability to discern is a new phenomenon with me, maybe I am ‘discerning affected’, or maybe now the sum is as important as the parts. I think there is this space created when you allow the world to surprise you. It’s not about seeing things in a different light, its going beyond and recognising that light consists of seven colours.

Its as much about seeing things differently as letting things be seen.