After reading and feeling moved beyond belief at Kim Morgan’s post about Mulholland Drive, I just thought I would share how I fell in love with Mr. Lynch.

I was 22. I was meeting friends in Tucson who didn’t get off work until late, so I thought I would catch a flick at the local arthouse cinema, The Loft. They happened to be playing Mulholland Drive, and I thought, what the hey, let’s start this adventure. I had no idea what I was in for that evening. I was there super early, so I was able to snag one of the giant overstuffed, old comfy chairs down in front.

Me in the theatre. But I was alone, “Crying.”

It began, I was hypnotized. Usually I like to peek behind me, a la Amelie, to see other people’s faces, but I had no control over my body. It had transported into the L.A. area of Lynchian dreams.

I was enamored with the ferocious beauty of Laura Elena Harring, I was repulsed and fascinated with the different faces and decomposition of Naomi Watts (was it really her, dead in bed?), I was enchanted by weird L.A., that wasn’t far off the mark.

I could barely process it as the film ended. It felt like someone had been clutching my heart for two hours. I wanted to sit there and demand they show it to me again. As I filed out of the theatre with everyone else, I felt a blue buzz inside me. The world had changed. It was midnight and my friends were wanting to get together, but I told them I needed a little bit. Sounds overdramatic, but like I said, the world had changed. I started to drive just to calm myself, but then something strange happened. I passed one street called Camilla. Weird, I thought, that was a character name. Then I passed a street called Magnolia, another Lynch movie. Finally, I blew by a Betty or Coco of some sorts: a shop, or a sign, I can’t even remember, my mind was reeling. That was it. I pulled over to collect myself. Why had this movie affected me so much? What was going on with my mind?

I did the only thing I could think to do: I drove to the labyrinth. The labyrinth was a place I had been going to since I was a student at the U of A, waaay back in 2003. It was located on church grounds, but it never had a sense of religion to me. It was a place I could walk around, focus on something and figure out what had happened.

As I wound around the familiar paint on cement, I started to relax a bit and the panic subsided. I was slowly working out the movie in my head. It had affected me so strongly because of its absurdity. It jumped around, people were honest but maddeningly mysterious. Even in the daylight hours of the film, there was an overwhelming sense of another plane of reality.

I can’t really sum it up better than Kim Morgan, but for me, this film sealed the deal. David Lynch and I, we are buds.

On a lighter, way less dramatic note, one of my favorite videos of David Lynch: David Lynch Loves Quinoa