Atonement

My wife and I rented the movie, "Atonement" on a swampy spring night. The movie was powerful, crude at times, and beautiful in its way.

There was a scene in the movie, that moved me so deeply that I feel scarred by its raw beauty and terrible honesty.

The scene begins with the main character stumbling upon the Dunkirk beach after the bloody battle has concluded. He is with two other comrades and the camera skillfully and randomly follows each soldier as they peruse the aftermath of the bloody battle. Soldiers carousing, horses being euthanized, a nuclear family consoling each other in shock of being thrust into this scene, death, stranded boats, and one scene whereby soldiers sing a hymn that blends convincingly into the passion of the scene. The music, with an underpinning of cello, provides a powerful backdrop to the scene, so beautifully intertwined that it could have been written with the hand of God.

As the camera comes upon the main character his face is set in weary searching. Searching for what? We only find out part of what he is searching for at the end of the movie. But he is searching for so much more. And it is here that I thought of my father. But why? The scene played continuously in my conscious and subconscious for days. When I downloaded the music selection to my iPod and listened to it at a quiet moment at work, I cried, hopeless tears, and thought again of my father.

But why? Why did this scene that was so tied to the movie and its plot make me cry for my father? Because it was in that scene that I related to the main character's searching and hopelessness. He is searching for meaning, for hope, for stability, for the life that was, for the glimmer that there can be happy times again.

And that is how I find myself a year after my fathers death. Desperately searching, hoping. I thought by this time I would have moved beyond that deep mourning and painful aching. The sharp pain has eased, but the dull numbing pain remains and shows no signs of ebbing.

I am searching...

Elegy for Dunkirk-Atonement