THE ENCHANTED COTTAGE

Beaver
Fossil range: Late Miocene - Recent

There is a wonderful movie with Robert Young of all people. Young and Dorothy McGuire are misshapen and scarred people who somehow find love in this enchanted land where their  flaws are taken away. They are ugly no longer and find love together. It was made in 1945.

It is actually a remake of a 1924 silent classic; starring Mary McAlvoy and Richard Barthelmess.

Bashforth and Laura discover that the cottage has a long history as a honeymoon cottage; lovers have trysted there for more than two centuries. Gradually, Bashforth and Laura fall in love. As this happens, they subjectively become more attractive. He loses his deformities, whilst Laura becomes more beautiful and starts looking like May McAvoy. The film subtly persuades us that this is a subjective transformation rather than an actual change. Bashforth's and Laura's only neighbour is a retired major (very well played by Holmes Herbert) who's blind, so he 'sees' the couple in terms of their personalities, not their physical appearance.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0014869/

This unforgettable film is for lovers of love stories. THE ENCHANTED COTTAGE contains the message that true love is etched in the human heart and beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder. Young is an embittered, suicidal and facially disfigured WWI veteran who meets McGuire, a girl so plain that no one would look at her twice. They eventually marry and move into a secluded cottage which is enchanted by the love found within its walls by its previous occupants over the years: it is a Honeymoon cottage of which Natwick knows to contain a legendary spell. Slowly and miraculously, through their love for each other, the couple find each-other immensely attractive to each other: Young has regained his youthful handsomeness and McGuire is blossomed into a great beauty. The film's theme of love's triumph over adversity was cruelly attacked by many critics in 1945, but the story is beautifully handled, written and tastefully acted. Young and McGuire underplay their roles which would easily have been labled histrionic in less capable hands. In supporting roles, Mildred Natwick and Herbert Marshall are fine. First filmed as the silent FOREVER in 1924 with Richard Barthelmess and May McAvoy, this was Robert Young's personal favourite of all his movies. http://www.amazon.com/Enchanted-Cottage-RKO-Collection-VHS/dp/6301415159

It is a wonderful film. I am no fan of American films made in the forties and fifties because of the propaganda that usually accompanies the plot as well as the censorship that is not apparent from films made at the same time in Europe. A good English film in 1955 is much more intriguing; believe me. I could go on an on about how the wonderful Hitchcock flicks of the thirties were just destroyed when remade in the U.S. with idiots like Jimmy Stewart taking on the lead roles. But enough is enough.

The 1945 movie is not a waste of film, believe me.

I had lost everything by 2004 and ended up in a cottage by the lake owned by one of my clients. He was a traveling ER doctor, a fan of rush Limbaugh, and a collector of real estate. Some young lady got ahold of him since and now he is my age with two little kids under age four. See, God will punish the unjust at times. Hahaahahahah

At any rate for 2004 and 2005, I lived on this lake in kind of a large A-Frame overlooking a 'lake' that was really part of a Snake River chain of lakes in the northern hinterlands. When I first found this TPM site I wrote about a walk I made with Scout, the doctor's dog that nobody wanted. I think three people read the blog and I got one recommendation. Ahhaahaha

The 'complex' of homes had become an association over the years. The A-Frame where I resided was probably built in the 80's. Most of the homes were erected sometime in the 1930's. There were some small little cottages and some larger homes but not the mansions you would see in the burbs nowadays.

After the association was created you really were not 'seized' of the real estate. You had a 99 year lease and were subject to rules of the association. The doctor broke one rule by letting me stay there because only relatives were welcome. It was like a gated community without gates.  There was a 9 hole golf course on the main site of the association that could be played four months out of the year.

This same complex would be worth hundreds of millions of dollars in northern New York State. But I don't think that the residents there would awake in the morning with another Birch tree lost to the beavers that would reek havoc six months out of the year. Hahahaha. Everything was supposed to be so well planned. I mean the levels of the lakes were controlled by the powers that be. But the beavers screwed up everything with their dams and federal as well as state law prevented killing the critters.

GOD I LOVED THOSE BEAVERS. HAHAHAHAHAHA.

Of course if you went down to the country registrar you would probably find the old restrictions on ownership that were prevalent in the olden days. But those days are gone and I do recall seeing and meeting one association member who was African-American.

This is a strange part of the country. Now I am 20 miles from this lake site and there are two important towns that are of import in this discussion.

One town is called 'Embarrass' and the other town is 'Tower'. There are many towns up here with strange names, I mean one is actually called 'Climax'. That is right. Climax, Minnesota. At any rate Embarrass and Tower have a national significance. They are both along the same road to the holy tabernacle of the Ojibwa Casino located about 40 miles from Virginia, where I currently reside.

The famous headline of the last fifty years was Embarrass Woman Dies in Climax, but that is another story.

Tower and Embarrass will compete as to where the coldest place is in the continental United States. For a century. Hahahaha.

First I must preface this discussion with a little Minnesota wisdom. If you decide you are going to get into some healthy regimen, in this neck of the woods, you must say 'FUCK THE ELEMENTS'.

You do not get up on the morning and look outside and see if it is safe to take a walk. If you have that attitude, do not get a dog. Not up here. If it is raining you are going to walk. If it is snowing you are going to walk. If it is below zero you are going to walk. I mean you are going to find maybe sixty days in an entire year that could be categorized as 'temperate'. Hahahahaha

Scout was an old, old Golden. She was pretty easy to get along with. She would simply eat whatever I ate mixed into some dry dog food. She would realize my temperament and simply lie on the floor staring at me until I took her for one of our two long walks everyday.  I swear her stare would be most piercing if I delayed the inevitable.

I recall one of those years was the coldest we had had in years. The key to survival is layered clothing. You have long underwear. Then a pair of jeans. Then a snow suit. Remembering of course to put on an undershirt, a long sleeved shirt along with at least two sweaters.  Once I started to get dressed, Scout would be jumping up and down in anticipation for the GREAT SAFARI. Hahhaahah

Well, you kind of get into it. I mean its twenty five below. LET'S GET GOING. My Scout did not give one goddamn how cold it was. Ever. We would start out with the leash and then she would run free most of the time.  A third of the time I would call her chicken brain of course, since she did not UNDERSTAND BASIC RULES OF CONDUCT. But that is another story.

I mean I lived as a hermit, but you kind of get into how fucking cold can it get?

So the cottage is about twenty miles from Tower and Embarrass. And I wake up and hear on the telly that it is 42 below. A new record. But the real story is that Embarrass gets the record because THE TOWER THERMOMETER BROKE. Hhahhaahahahahh. The one claim for fame, and the goddamn thermometer broke. Hahahahah. I shall remember that till the day I die.

That is all I got on this personal diary today.

I must of course close with this:

I HATE DICK CHENEY.

That is just for those who claim I cannot blog without mentioning how much I HATE DICK CHENEY. hahhaahahahha