Every time I get no further . . .

The lyrics to "Like a Friend" by Pulp are some of the best I've ever heard and it just hit me as to why it resonates with me much more than many of the other songs that I love. Three point fifty-seven minutes of pure perfection that I identify with (except for the part about bodies in trunks, although I understand what he's trying to get across). I've been in that situation many times before and the memories, good or bad, swell up within me when I listen to it.
So I've been trying to better identify with the arts by digging for deeper meaning in that which I both create and/or enjoy, cherish, respect. But does all art have to have meaning?
A friend commented on the illustration from my previous post (working title: "Manifesto of Melany") that although he liked it, he wanted to know what was I trying to tell with the drawing and then asked what did I want an audience to get out of it. Great questions that I could not answer. His thoughts, and ways of looking at things, are modern Bohemian whereas I like what I like because I do or don't.
I suppose some of this has to do with the time I met Neil Gaiman at a comic book convention in Philadelphia when I was an impressionable teenager. Repeat:impressionable!
Back then, he was simply a comic book writer. Sure his comics were sophisticated, dark, and nonpareil, but I was a kid who was just learning about art, writing, and films (mostly foreign and usually horror). I was infatuated by auteurs such as Dario Argento, Woody Allen, and David Cronenberg to name just a few. I felt that it was better to talk to him about something non comics-related so I wouldn't come off as a drooling fanboy. As a result, I struck up a conversation with M. Gaiman about Argento's film "Suspiria." What he told me was that he liked it. He also told me that he was once a film critic in years past and that he didn't particularly enjoy that job very much. All he could ever say in a review was whether he liked a film or not. I guess I related to that and, from that point on, decided to figure out many different ways of saying "I like(d) it" rather than figure out what the artists were trying to say. I hope Gaiman wasn't being glib with me to scoot me away.
At 32, I'd rather be more like the tweed jacket/suede elbow patch wearing intelligentsia (favorite word, btw) that I admire and be able to readily quote Pauline Kael to strengten my arguments, drop the name Albert Ellis when appropriate, or recall an NPR segment without using the words "um," "like," or "thing."
"Thingee," on the other hand, is readily acceptable.
Hopefully, this has been the "film thats so bad [you stayed] till the end."