"Before I'm Dead" by Kidneythieves

We're going to stay within the Vampire Chronicles, simply because the "Queen of the Damned" was one of the best soundtracks that came out of the early 2000s. I could do a post on every single song on the album, it's that good. I've been watching this YouTube channel about the different ways film addresses meaning, through philosophy and metaphysics. It has illuminated some of my favorite movies in ways I have never thought. One of the ways the channel accomplishes that is through discussing different character archetypes and, of course, how those archetypes play out on The Hero's Journey. One of the videos I watched today mentioned that the Hero's Journey always begins with an initiation. A transitional experience (and often, a choice) the Hero must encounter in order to cross over from the profane world (that which know as ordinary reality) into the sacred world. In the video, the narrator stated that in the modern era, our encounters with the sacred world are becoming more sparse. Entry into the sacred world used to be something every human experienced, because it was baked into our tribal culture through rites of passage. Now, a contemporary human may go their entire lives without passing through any barriers into transcendence. The irony is that society has invented pseudo-initiations to fill in the gap, but very few things come close to the transformative event that is described in the Hero's Journey.

This discussion of the sacred-profane dichotomy brought to mind the Order of the Talamasca. The Talamasca is a secret society in the Vampire/Mayfair Witch Chronicles that was established to keep watch over the world of the paranormal. As desperately as I wish such a thing existed, the most disappointing thing about this secret society is it is purely academic - or it's meant to be. Their motto is "We watch. And we are always there." But that's all they're supposed to do. However, it's an occultist society and you can imagine the type of people it attracts. Naturally, it attracts people who feel out of place in the profane world. People who, without proof, believe that something more must exist. Or they come from lineages well-steeped in the mysterious and supernatural. Some of my favorite characters in the Chronicles timeline - Jessica "Jesse" Reeves and Merrick Mayfair - are just such people. We'll focus on Jesse, because she's one of the main characters in "Queen of the Damned." She's orphaned at a young age but is sent to live with relatives of what is referred to as The Great Family. The Great Family was born of one of the oldest vampires, Maharet, before she was turned by Akasha, who wanted to claim her power as witch through consuming her blood. The mythos of the Chronicles is intense and varied, so I'll try to sum up as best I can without rewriting the whole damn series. After she is turned, Maharet makes it her mission to ensure her descendants are taken care of. She even visits many of them regularly, though she keeps her distance. This is probably what I'd do if I were immortal. As sad as it would be, I'd still watch my son grow up. And then his children after him. And their children after them. Jesse knows Maharet as her aunt but has always felt drawn to her and the forced distance has always weighed on her heart. Jesse has natural psychic gifts of her own, which is how the Talamasca finds and recruits her. However, she is charged to watch the supernatural world but be not of it. Ultimately, she cannot uphold that promise, because it is built on an unstable foundation. It goes against her soul and there is nothing so untenable as trying to keep a promise that is in conflict with your soul. The irony is that the Talamasca is filled with people who long to join the sacred world, but most are too cowardly to face the initiation and so choose to dress up their cowardice as "academic interest" or "serving the common good." They hide behind societal morals and ethics, always with one toe on the threshold but never daring to cross.

Epochs fly, reminds me

What I hide, reminds me

The desert skies

Cracks the spies

Reminds me what I never tried

The ocean wide salted red

Reminds me what to do before I'm dead

Some do, though. Jesse does, in the end. As does Merrick Mayfair (although that's an entire novel on its own). And, of course, the ethereal beauty of the Mayfair witches draws in its fair share of male Talamasca members, most of whom suffer an unfortunate fate. They forgot the most important guideline - never fall in love with a witch....not even once. The only thing almost as tragic is having a vampire fall in love with you, which is what happens to Jesse. To be fair, Lestat has a habit of falling in love with everyone, so she's kind of the rule, not the exception. Still, Lestat offered and she accepted. That's the difference. To go on the Hero's Journey, when presented with an opportunity, you must accept it. Yes, in some cases, the Hero is forced onto the path but there is always a choice to not continue. There's always the option to go back to The Shire and live out the rest of your days peacefully. There's nothing wrong with this except that you'll always be haunted by the "what ifs," which isn't so bad. You can be haunted by "what ifs" for opportunities that weren't even possibilities for you, anyway, so it seems a small price to pay for a comfortable life. It just seems like a shame to merely taste the extraordinary only to go back to the mundane, with very little to show for it except memories. In order to be transformed, you have to be immersed in the sacred fully and come out the other side. One must walk through flames and allow the old self (i.e., the ego) be utterly destroyed. But you must go in willingly, with no illusions of security or comfort. Only then can the Hero emerge.

"Before I'm Dead" Video