Beyond the Frame 001 ·
The Current Remains
On Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
My mother worked at Con Ed. Electricity belonged to the world I grew up in before it became a language in my work. Now I think about what travels through a wire. What reaches a screen. What stays in a child long after the television is off.
I carried a lot of trauma. I also carried the feeling that there was more for me to do. Terminator 2 gave that feeling somewhere to live. A boy could matter. A mother could be terrified and still fight for him. Something built to kill could learn to protect. I needed that possibility.
John teaching the machine restraint stays with me. All that power and a child has to explain why a life matters. Sarah knows what can happen. Her fear makes sense. So does her son's refusal to let fear decide everything.
I'm forty now. Two sons. Songs and poems. Films taking shape. Still trying to make something honest out of what happened. I understand the need for a protector differently when my children look at me. Purpose has become more physical. Showing up. Listening. Keeping my word when I'm tired.
I write about intelligence because I care what we teach power to do. I make art because experience disappears when nobody carries it forward. That film still reaches the boy in me. These days I have something to tell him: we're here. There is work to do. There are people to love.