Ennis' and Jack's Relationship, II

[Marge_Innavera]

Only very fortunate people recognize a time in their lives when they are completely happy. I think we're programmed to look forward into the future so we expect to be able to repeat these times but that often doesn't happen because the contributing factors change. We change. I remember Ang Lee remarking that the boys tried and failed to recreate their time on the mountain for the rest of their lives and as it says in the trailer "There are places you can't return" and I think they subconsciously accepted that by never returning to Brokeback. How could you ever completely recapture something so "otherworldly", so ephemeral and so fragile? The memory of the DE was as close as it ever got, a snapshot of a perfect moment frozen in time but unrepeatable.

IMO that's one of the things that makes BBM so universal.  What you described above is a universal experience: the lost time when everything in your world seemed to fit and work together perfectly. Those are the places you can't return to.

But of course homophobia is the wild card there. If it weren't for that, Ennis and Jack would have remembered that first summer together in years to come as a wonderful time that would never be repeated but they'd have other memories to balance that out.  As it was ... all they had, as Jack says was Brokeback Mountain or rather the memory of it.

[Desecra]

So true. 

[morrobay]

Bringing this over from the "Were they gay?" thread, where Stan made a comment that Jack wasn't ready to leave his "cushy life"...which prompted me to ask...

How difficult would it have been for Jack to up and leave his "cushy life"?  Would LD have given him enough to make it worth it? 

Jack stated early on that he would leave for Ennis but we don't know if he ever brought it up again, or just gave up altogether.  It sounds like he had no problem leaving his family - why not just take the money and start the c&c?  At least he'd be doing something he liked, instead of selling machinery to clones of LD; and Ennis might have been lured to something concrete, an existing c&c operation, not just a pipedream.

oh yeah, I forgot - it's AP...

[royandronnie]

I have always believed that, yes, at the time in 1967, it would have been easy for Jack to leave, in the white-hot heat of his love for Ennis. BUT--by that time he'd already been living a lot better than he was used to, for a year or two at least. So it would have been bumpy to go back to an unheated house which might or might not have had indoor plumbing.

By 1983? Even 1975? Mmm. Jack was always looking ahead, for that better life. And he bitched and complained all the time. And ranches generally don't seem to have done too well. I see BIG issues ahead. It had been long time since he'd had to get up at 4AM and muck out.

[AZ.bbm]

Seriously agree on that! Mucking out can be enjoyable/fun if you're doing it for/with someone you love.

BTW, let me clarify, MB, about Jack's "cushy life"..  When I said I thought that Jack Twist wasn't ready to give it up, I meant to say 'not entirely on a moment's notice'; i.e., Jack didn't want to take the risk of ditching his family in Childress then having Ennis reject him after relocating to Riverton to be near him (which is what I would have done, myself,  if I remained head-over-heels in love with someone, for several years). But unfortunately he couldn't get Ennis to commit to him, except for the bi-annual rendezvous way out in the middle of nowhere to commune with nature (and how!).

[morrobay]

Do you think that Jack knew for sure that Ennis loved him?  He always hoped......Ennis was pretty damn good at hiding it, even from himself, up until he found the shirts.  

I guess if you look at it from a strictly romantic point of view, the answer would be yes of course he did, no doubt, they knew each other's hearts and minds....blah blah blah

But did he really know?  We know so little about their relationship.....guess I'll go back to section I, page 1 of this thread.....

[morrobay]

Reading a discussion from 2006 in which Nikki said she felt that they had kissed on the mountain, that she felt it “enhances their love.”

I would like to think they did, but truly I feel they did not kiss.  I believe it was as AP described:

As it did go. They never talked about the sex, let it happen, at first only in the tent at night, then in the full daylight with the hot sun striking down, and at evening in the fire glow, quick, rough, laughing and snorting, no lack of noises, but saying not a goddamn word except once Ennis said, "I'm not no queer," and Jack jumped in with "Me neither. A one-shot thing. Nobody's business but ours."

It felt good.  Jack was funny, became a good friend, they were having fun, having sex.  When they had to leave early, Ennis didn’t know why it affected him so…he couldn’t quite connect the dots…he’d miss his friend, (couldn’t admit he’d miss the sex), but it was so much more than that...did he know then, and just wasn’t able to face it?

At the time of the reunion Ennis, after getting gut cramps, taking a year to figure out that he shouldn’t have let Jack go, and finally being in his arms again, registers for the first time that it is LOVE he feels.  He’s overcome by these feelings, the best he’s felt (in his life?).

When the euphoria fades, as they lie in bed in the motel, he snaps out of it.  He knows now, and says as much to Jack:

"That summer," said Ennis. "When we split up after we got paid out I had gut cramps so bad I pulled over and tried to puke, thought I ate somethin bad at that place in Dubois. Took me about a year a figure out it was that I shouldn't a let you out a my sights. Too late then by a long, long while."

but is totally unable act on his feelings, so his only method of survival is to agree to see Jack out in the middle of nowhere.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. It ain't goin a be that way. We can't. I'm stuck with what I got, caught in my own loop. Can't get out of it. Jack, I don't want a be like them guys you see around sometimes. And I don't want a be dead....

The sadness of it is enormous.

[janjo]

I suppose it depends on whether you regard kissing as part of sex?

[morrobay]

not for them

[janjo]

Why not?

[morrobay]

it's what I believe

[kittykat]

Doesn't make a difference to me. They kiss in the movie on the mountain, and I saw the movie before reading the book, so that's what I go by.

[morrobay]

Profound

[janjo]

I can't see kissing is precluded, and obviously Diana Ossana didn't see that either, but some people do see it your way and that is your prerogative.

[morrobay]

thank you very much