Love Stinks in Pop Culture

What are the best love stories in pop culture, today?

New Year’s Eve? Gack.
Crazy, Stupid, Love? About cheating and divorce.
Just Go With It? Adam Sandler. It’s a love of childish humor.
Breaking Dawn? There we have it.

And before you start going on about, “This is a Twilight bashing post” I’m going to stop you right there.

Yes, it is.

But it’s much more than that.

The concept of love in a movie has been whittled down into this poor excuse for a relationship that is the Twilight saga. And before that, it was a Nicholas Sparks book adapted into a film.

Step 1: Two pretty white people fall in love.
Step 2: One dies.
Step 3: Advertise with a stupid reused poster of two people kissing with the guy holding the cheeks of the girl. (Rain optional)
Step 4: Profit

So, my coworker, who is 10 years younger than I am (damn kids, kidding), asked me, “What was the love story of your day?” Meaning “What did girls and adult females consider the pinnacle of romance back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth and phones had mangled fifty foot long cords.”

I thought about it and here’s what I came up with, looking at it generationally (20 year period) from 1978 through 1998. I would have been between the ages of three and 23 during this period.

General Hospital (1978) Luke and Laura
As a kid, I remember two big romantic to dos in the world. Luke and Laura being married and Charles and Diana. Since we are talking about impacting television, readers, or movie goers, I think Luke and Laura win out in that category. However, like Twilight, the beginning of this supercouple involves a bad relationship… including a drunken Luke raping Laura. While Twilight never moves toward sexual assault, there is a case for an abusive relationship.

Empire Strikes Back (1980) Geeks in love?
Well, every preteen in 1983 made the jump to hyper-puberty when Carrie Fisher showed up in the gold bikini on Jabba the Hutt’s party barge, but three years before, romance filled the galaxy as Han and Leia pouted. The already sexual tension filled storyline between the two characters, which kicked off in the first movie, mixed with Irvin Kershner’s direction pretty much set the stage for romance among the stars as Han and Leia smooched in the bowels of a space slug aboard the Millennium Falcon and led to one of the greatest improved lines of all, “I know.”

Why does that work? It seems kind of cocky and prick worthy, which IS Han Solo, but watch that scene directly after the scenes in the Falcon, and in the corridors of Echo Base on Hoth. Han is pretty much saying, “You love me. Why won’t you admit that I am an OK guy and that we could be good together?”

When Leia says, “I love you,” Han could easily say to her, “I love you, too.” He doesn’t. Why? Because he acknowledges that she has taken that step into the abyss and torn down the wall between their feelings. She’s confirming his statement to her back on Hoth about, “…because of the way you feel about me.” This isn’t goodbye. He gets that she gets it and let’s her know that he understands and welcomes what she is saying, not just because of the circumstance they are in at the moment.

Brat Pack Invasion (1984-89) The combination of John Huges and Cameron Crowe
This one spans almost five years, five films, two directors, and 20 plus actors. Probably the biggest comparison can make to teen love and angst comes in the form of Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink, The Breakfast Club, Some Kind of Wonderful and Say Anything. Even though some people often think Say Anything is a John Hughes movie, because of the cast and subject matter, it has nothing to do with Hughes. It’s actually a bit darker in tone because of the plotline involving John Mahoney going to jail. It still follows some of the formula that John Hughes mined for 80s movie gold and it’s still awesome 23 years later.

Whether it be Claire and Bender, Duckie and Andie and Blaine, Samantha and Jake, Watts and Keith and Amanda, or Diane and Lloyd, the history of love and heartbreak is as universal as Shakespeare or even the triangle of Jacob and Bella and Edward. (gack.)

But teen girls everywhere hearted Jake Ryan and Lloyd Dobler. They wanted to be with bad boy John Bender and even sort of pulled for Keith to stop going after Amanda Jones and choose the tomboyish drummer, Watts, who may have resembled them in a way.

John Hughes and Cameron Crowe wrote dialogue that normal teenagers didn’t use out loud but their thoughts mirrored what the characters said on film. It would be another ten years before that kind of sentiment was expressed through scripts spoken by high school kids.

Then there’s this: The ultimate expression of love for millions of guys hurt by the girl they love.

Phantom of the Opera (1986) She chose wrong!
My own wife thinks that Christine should have gone with the Phantom. Of course, she loves Twilight, too.  Well, a lot of women and girls loved the Andrew Lloyd Webber adaptation of the Gaston Leroux novel. Though anyone with any kind of theatrical training loathes how this became the standard for musical theater) High School and College Freshman drama geeks who dedicated their lives, or at least an entire wall in their bedrooms, to POTO were worse than Hipsters or Gleeks are today.

Beauty and the Beast (1987-1990) Television Series with Linda Hamilton and Ron Pearlman.
RON FREAKING PERLMAN! Female audiences swooned over the prosthetic faced enhanced Perlman as Vincent. He looked like a cross between the lead singer for Europe and the transformed Michael Jackson at the beginning of Thriller. Of course, that’s understandable because the makeup for both was done by Rick Baker. The relationship between the two transcended looks and worlds and Vincent was probably better looking Fabio in most rights.

Sadly, the show suffered the loss of Linda Hamilton in season three, at her desire. Hey, she didn’t pull a David Caruso. The following year she went full throttle into stardom, reprising her role as Sarah Conner in T2.

Disney Strikes Back (1989-1993)  Four movies that made you fall in love all over again
The Classic era of Disney animated features is speckled with a rich lineup.  Snow White, Cinderella, The Lady and the Tramp, and Sleeping Beauty all had strong romantic themes to them.  We've all, at least, attempted to push a meatball across the plate with our nose or slurped up a single noodle between us and our significant other at one time or another.  But it would be 30 years before the notion of a strong romantic storyline would grace the cels of a Disney animated film.  The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King all had the same things in common; strong female characters, a love story, and Oscar winning songs by Alan Menken, collaborating first with Howard Ashmen then Tim Rice after Ashmen's death in 1991. 

The themes in those three movies resonated for adults as much as they did in children and made Disney the animation powerhouse to beat,until a little company called Pixar animated a few toys.  It also didn't hurt to have some of the top R&B Soul and Pop Music artists record your main theme song.  This was a trend that started with Beauty and the Beast and continued through Tarzan.  Each year becoming a little more ridiculous as they trotted out past their prime pop stars from the 80s like Phil Collins and Michael Bolton.  Sadly, Michael Bolton's best work since then was in an SNL Digital Short called "Jack Sparrow".  Regardless, love was in the air but the heavy handed love song from The Lion King, while extremely popular, its place in the film is a bit lost as the love story between Simba and Nala is a minor one.  That's probably why "The Circle of Life" was also a big hit from the soundtrack, unlike previous years which only had one song on Top 40 radio.

***UPDATE***
The Wonder Years (1988-1993) Kevin Arnold and Winnie Cooper
I can't believe I forgot this one.   I almost pulled an Entertainment Weekly.  The world of puberty told through the eyes of Kevin Arnold by one of the Sticky Bandits.  The first episode set all the groundwork you needed for romance history.  That one girl in the neighborhood.  The one that was always there, geeky and awkward.  She comes back after one summer and she's transformed into the goddess of your dreams.  Then, you know how it goes, you make plans to get some of that and you envision her dead Vietnam Vet brother protecting her from likes of you.

Kevin and Winnie's was one of those tv romances that worked because it was sweet and innocent.  The show worked because it was life for all of us who grew up with them. It was the romantic equivalent of A Christmas Story for me. 

Unfortunately, YouTube won't let me embed this but it's a great compendium of Kevin and Winnie moments.

My So-Called Life (1994) Angela and Jordan
My friend actually called me on this one.  How could I forget it?  Sad to say, a lot of people did miss this bright spot in the tv spectrum.   It was cancelled before it's time and while it was on par with the WB Explosion a few years later, in terms of pop culture impact, it was too dark for ABC and mainstream programming.

The relationship between Angela and Jordan was one of those troubled teen romances that was a great parallel for how kids acted in the real world.  The dialogue was smart and the angst was almost Shakespearean in nature.  While their relationship wasn't the main focus on the show, it was probably one of the most memorable aspects of it.

***END UPDATE***

Titanic (1997)  The biggest thing that went down wasn't the ship...
Unfortunately, this is probably the single biggest impact on romantic film or television of any age group during my cross section of life. In fact, the biggest thing in this film isn’t the historical account of the ship hitting the iceberg or its sinking, it’s the imagined love story between a lady of status and a third class passenger.

I say, “Unfortunately” because, for how big a film it was, the footprint is almost clichéd and tacky when you think back about it. I mean, no one thought skinny ties and ugly sweaters were enough to give kids the eyeroll treatment of us when we first wore them. But looking back you have to cringe at the notion that we left the house thinking we looked cool in pegged jeans and mullets. The emo generation probably think that loving Celine Dion’s song is the biggest crime against music since Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech. And, if I didn’t agree with Kanye in some small way, I’d think it was too, even though I own the Titanic soundtrack.

Let’s face it, it’s a tacky love song and almost an overly melodramatic chick flick, 15 years later. Holy Crap?!?! My wife’s niece wasn’t even alive when this film came out. Gawd, I’m old. Shut the blinds, I don’t want to see the light!

The WB Years (1997, 1998) The second coming of John Hughes for television
As a little upstart network, far down the depth chart of the television dial, The WB cranked up the competition with the big four by populating its lineup with smarty-smart teeny bopper dialogue from maverick's like Joss Whedon and Kevin Williamson. Having a self deprecating and self aware outlook on teen life and romance, they wrote smart dialogue for shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Dawson’s Creek.

Much like John Hughes, 15 years before them, Joss’ and Kevin’s characters spoke differently than the average real life teen but their take on relationships were a lot more real and acceptable than Stephanie Meyer. Not saying they were any less abusive. It’s not every day that a girl loses her virginity to a hundred year old vampire who then wants to torture and kill her and her friends. But, it’s a better metaphor for giving into peer pressure and sexual urges only to find that what you’ve built up as the end all, be all of human existence turns out to be a monster who doesn’t share your sentiment after the deed is done. Whether or not you have to kill that boy in order to save the world is beside the point.

Dawson grew up with the Nick at Nite version (my generation’s version) of parents and his life was far from realistic but like John Hughes’ characters, everyone rooted for Joey Potter and sometimes Jen Lindley. After all, it was the typical Ginger and Mary Ann contrast of female characters. You want Ginger for sex, but you want to settle down with Mary Ann. Just like girls WANTED John Bender for sex, but wanted Brian Johnson for a loyal and dependable husband figure.

But there is still the eyeroll factor when you look back at the early WB teen romance shows and realize that “I’ll Be” was the “In Your Eyes” of the first season finale and the pinnacle of love songs in which to express your true feelings to.  It was also the soundtrack for episode promos with that raspy voice over that wasn't Don LaFontaine

I weep for the young today.  Why? 

This



The 80s Are Truly Over: RIP John Hughes

John Hughes
1950-2009

Judd Apatow might as well be dubbed the premier comedic director/writer of the first decade in the 21st century. Granted he’s only been hugely successful on the back half of the decade but that’s OK. He’s probably got a lock on pop culture that will look back on him with fondness in 20 years.

But while Judd has been able to recapture the 80s style of raunchy comedy with the likes of Superbad, Knocked Up and Forgetting Sarah Marshall, there is another writer/director that perfectly captured the angst of being a teenager 20 years earlier. Apatow’s Freaks and Geeks could be considered an updating of that genre of entertainment made popular by John Hughes, who died on August 6th. With his passing, a realization has set into my mind. The 80s are truly over.

I have preached on more than one occasion that I am a person deeply rooted in the 1980s. That decade shaped my entire life from the politics, the fashion trends, technology, and popular culture. To future generations the 80s will probably feel like the 40s or 50s. Nostalgic and revered by us. Misunderstood and scoffed at by everyone else.

So it goes that Hollywood and more importantly films of the 80s became a primer for those of us who grew up in it. We were taught that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. We learned that if you need to generate enough power to travel back in time, and don’t have plutonium, lightning will work. We understood that the only way to really impress a girl was to either stand outside her window, holding a boom box over our head, blaring Peter Gabriel or whenever possible, put on side one of Led Zeppelin IV. Beyond these essential life lessons we also learned that each one of us is a brain, and an athlete, a basket case, a princess, and a criminal.

That’s the teen movement in the 80s. The simplest and most convenient definition of who we were. Shallowness was something we worked through while aspiring to be Alex P. Keaton or Gordon Gekko. It was the rite of passage we had to take to come out in the 90s as a more rounded person. But no one spoke to us like we were adults, except John Hughes. He knew exactly what if felt like to be a teen growing up in the burbs of America, dealing with angst over dating and success after high school. The comedy was front and center but the subtlety of the dialogue reached through that pastel neon exterior into the bare soul of adolescence. He was able to merge the capitalistic themes of the decade with the fragile psyche that hid behind it.

Sixteen Candles captures the follies of crushes and coming of age so perfectly, you recognize it like It was your own life. Samantha Davis falls somewhere in the middle of social status, pursuing an older guy out of her league while being pursued by a younger, awkward geek known as Farmer Ted. The food chain moves along as status is portrayed as exciting and enticing but bad. Geek mentality is played for laughs but outside of the quest for a girl’s panties loyalty and true friendship are underlying. Whether John Hughes wrote himself as the character of Samantha or Ted is beyond me though I suspect that there might have been a little bit of him in both.

When The Breakfast Club first came out I was only 11, so I didn’t see it in the theater. Before the booming market of home video and VCRs I had to wait for things to come to HBO or regular television. Of course we all know that basic cable distills out all the crudity of bare breasts and foul language so, for the most part I relied on HBO for a better enlightenment. Initially, I was not allowed to watch the film because of the language. Looking back it was pretty tame for today’s time but back then, Middle America was still loosening up its skinny tie a bit.

The film serves as a breaking down of the High School class system, taking stock characters such as “Brain” and “Athlete” and actually turning them inside out so you can see the flaws in their armor. The Brain is a failure at shop class while The Princess hates her seemingly perfect life as top of the social ladder. Yes, we are seeing a narrow cross section of all the social groups but also remember that in the 80s, the layers of social strata were thick and few, like the layers of musical genres. It wasn’t until the 90s that there was a huge splintering of types of music adding sub classes and derivatives of themes to Pop, Rock, Rap, New Wave, Blues, Jazz, and Country. Social Anthropology among high schools was as simple as a box of eight crayons. The box of 64 colors didn’t come along until later.

So, here we have these damaged and flawed archetypes thrown together in a situation that they would never experience outside of the one common denominator among kids in secondary education, detention. Institutional punishment pretty much levels the playing field on how they are treated as their roles may protest. Soon, they see the evolutionary flaw that exists in adolescence during the decade. The path to social classification is a linear, black and white road. It’s not until they are forced to examine their classmates’ character that they understand that they encompass each one of them inside themselves. For whatever reason, whether it be intelligence, physical aptitude or money, certain expectations bubbled to the surface. While they may be starkly different in their facades, they are all the same underneath. Pressure keeps them afraid to fail. Lack of adult understanding keeps them from evolving. Perception keeps them from exploring their personality.

Weird Science was more of a Freakenstein Comedy than coming of age tale. In fact, the high school aspect is pared down to an opening scene establishing the main characters as helpless geeks that are more interested in the physical aspect of the female form instead of the entire package. But that’s all you need to work from in terms of plot. Gary and Wyatt set out to build the perfect girl by combining what they believe are examples of perfection. Pulling from a trunk filled with magazines and adding in formulated behaviors like brains and aptitude, they mix together all the elements that society, especially 80s society, considers to be perfection in terms of beauty and brains.

The result is Kelly LeBrock’s, Lisa, although, I wonder where they got the British accent from in their magazine clippings. She is built and smart and everything they wanted, yet they are utterly afraid of the idea that she is there for the taking. The first thing they do is take a shower with her, wearing their jeans. The genie in the hard drive bottle is set on turning their lives upside down in an attempt to show them that fame and popularity are fleeting concepts. Fidelity and heart are long lasting. They are cooler than they realize, but like that shower scene, they are afraid to act on their instincts because they’ve been beaten and embarrassed into submissive roles. It’s a pie in the sky wish list of 80s social high points disguised in a letter to Penthouse.

Set against another typical 80s environment, a Suburbanite-Teen-House-Party-While-Parents-Are-Away, the popularity of Gary and Wyatt takes an extreme upshot as the entire class body descend on Wyatt’s uptight, 80s upper class home. Things are broken, sullied and thrown about as Gary and Wyatt once again find themselves unwilling to partake in the forbidden fruit that has eluded them during their teen years. A final straw breaks the patience of Lisa’s teaching the boys how to be real men which is not the same as what they perceive as ‘men’ in their shallow and popular counterparts. When Gary and Wyatt deal away Lisa to Ian and Max in exchange for their girlfriends in a masochistic swap, Lisa decides to make Gary and Wyatt jump off the cliff as she sends mutant bikers into the home to assault their guests. Rising to the occasion, the boys finally grab hold of all they really need in order to be heroes. It’s not the money, the clothes, the fame, or the girls. It’s the willingness to give all that away in order to do the right thing.

What ends up being apparent is that this test is more about getting Gary and Wyatt to accept that they had the power all along and to act on it. It could be about approaching girls or bullying brothers. But with that power comes great responsibility to realize that these girls, that they would gawk over and imagine in romantic situations, are not concepts but real people with real feelings. Even in their geek state, they treated women just like Ian and Max did, regardless of their actual interaction with them. By the end, everyone gets a lesson in perception.

What John Hughes did for teen comedy in the 80s is the same as what Shakespeare did with comedy in the 1600s. If Shakespeare were alive today, besides being really, really old, he’d be writing for television and popular movies. His comedies are pretty much a pastiche of similar characters, settings, and themes. John Hughes worked the medium the same way but his impact on the culture made it profitable and enjoyable.

The ideas of House Parties and Nerd Vs. Jock conflict were a common idea in the 80s. Besides the teen aspect of life, Hughes captured the convention of family vacations and holidays just as well, especially the concepts of families spending time together and apart in these situations. Adults are just as damaged as kids are, especially when it comes to living up to or surpassing the expectations of their parents and family. The plot is driven by people trying to get from Point A to Point B while dealing with outlandish obstacles.

The Vacation series, Uncle Buck and The Great Outdoors are all about families coming to grips with the idiosyncrasies that drive families to dysfunction and therapy. Man as the great world traveler. The loutish Uncle as the pseudo father figure. In-laws dealing with their different styles of parenting and social backgrounds. These all play out with tons of laughs, but it’s knowing how people really are that made Hughes a poet and genius.

Besides leaving a legacy of quotable films that no person born after 1991 will understand or appreciate, Hughes gave us all our upbringing in the 80s. He was our Dear Abby and Mike Brady, offering us advice and guidance through the murky waters of growing up during the end of The Cold War with bright colors and plastic fads. He will be missed, immensely. Even though he hasn’t been a public figure for years, his presence has been felt in movies today.

This year has truly been a sorrowful one as the icons of my childhood are slowly shuffling off the mortal coil. So, I think I will don my ripped up jeans, pop in a Thompson Twins or Simple Minds cassette, play some air keytar in my room as I reminisce about the glory days of the 80s when Farah was on my wall, Ed was on television, Michael was on the radio, and John Hughes was at the movies. Who’s with me? Bueller? Bueller?

Anyone?

Your all a bunch of Neo-Maxi Zoom Dweebies. The hell with you.



For the lighter side 80s cheese, check out one of my earliest posts, From The Path of Truth, John Hughes Hath Led Me Astray.

It's Good To Be the King!

Here we are at the end of another school year, a little older and hopefully a little wiser.  Memories were made and friends may be displaced as students disperse for the summer to their various summer activities.  Graduating seniors will either be faced with the real world as they move on from Academia to the Job Market.  Those that have not secured post school employment may find themselves moving back in with Mom and Dad for the summer or even longer.  Taking a look at their resume they study their achievements, deciding which will best serve them in the search for gainful employment.  Perhaps it would be best to remove the mention of membership in Who's Who Among American High School Students.  After all, recognition of that accolade is more about selling a big book of names than it is achieving any greatness and most schools could care less about it.  What about perfect attendance?  Is that a worthy mention on a resume?  While it's an achievement in not slacking or getting ill, it really doesn't hold a lot of water in the realm of job interviews.  I had 12 years of perfect attendance.  That's right; yours truly went all 12 years of primary and secondary education without missing a day.  Was I nuts for doing it?  Well, considering that the recognition for such a feat was a gold plated ruler etched with my name and years of attendance and those who had just one year got the same bauble, yeah, maybe I was.   Oooh, here's one.  PROM KING!  Now there is something that stands out on a resume to any perspective employer.  It says a lot about the person.  This person was involved in many school activities such as sports or class offices.  This person was chosen above all other students to represent his prom as a royal dignitary. This honor holds itself in such high regards that can only be matched by the amount of real power the Queen of England has or the winner of the 2000 US Presidential Election's popular vote.  In other words, it's a title, but it doesn’t get you a free ride on the subway.

I could have been Prom King.   That's right, I said me.  Ok, I wasn't the most popular or athletic.  I didn't participate in any sports and no one made sure to invite me to the big parties on the weekends, but that doesn't mean I didn't do a lot for my school.  Frankly, I joined the prom committee my junior year to try and meet and impress girls.  Call me Lucas, if you want, but I committed my time and helped put together two proms in my high school tenure.  In fact, my senior year, I helped pull off our prom theme with only $50 and an imagination.

Whether it is Enchantment Under the Sea or A Night to Remember, prom themes are tradition in indecision and tacky mylar cracked ice streamery.  Prom committees sit around like fantasy football enthusiasts with a catalog of Prom Theme Kits ranging anywhere from $100 to $1000 in prom committee dollars.  Those come from car washes and bake sales and whatever might be left over from the previous year.  My senior year the prom committee had decided on a New York style black and white classic theme with windows and lights and skylines.  Unfortunately, the kit we had agreed upon was $500 and would nearly eat up our entire budget.  It had a large stairway that led up to a white window frame with lights shining through on a blackened background.  Silhouetted city skylines with twinkle lights adorned the back of the scene as a shiny mylar runway split the main area for a grand march where a lighted column of fabric book ended the runway.  Being a drama/band person I looked at the catalog and laughed.   "Hell, I could pull that off for $50 and what we have backstage in the auditorium."  I proclaimed.  Soon eyes lit up and heads turned towards my direction.  Someone actually believed me and asked, "Really?"  Looking at the design it was rather simple.  There wasn't much to it.  The fact that they wanted to charge $500 was ridiculous.   I went on, "Yeah.  Look, the skyline is cardboard.  We can get a bunch of refrigerator boxes and spray paint them.  We have TWO staircases left over from the musical that we can cover with that extra black cloth and all the twinkle lights you could ask for.  All we need to do is buy mylar, gossamer, and spray paint.  All of that should cost us $50."  Soon I was thrust into the middle of a planning session.  I asked for the help of my stage crew friends to construct my bold promise.  We were going to use the backstage area to assemble all of the components and outside would be our painting area.  We contacted the local appliance store in town for old cardboard boxes from various large appliances.  We found two huge clam shells that we stuck in the gossamer to give it a round shape and put flood lamps on the floor in the gossamer columns.  I figured with the kit we would get enough to decorate a small portion of the stage and maybe a staging area.  Our plan involved going beyond what was on the page.  We went on to borrow a white wicker couch to have in between two columns against a lit background for pictures.  Since we were doing it for less, why not explore the possibilities.  We went nuts transforming the cafeteria and stage of the auditorium.   The capper?  One of our stage crew guys suggested enlisting someone to play a grand piano on stage right during the grand march.  It was the perfect marriage of ingenuity and existing resources.

During one of our final meetings before the prom the discussion turned towards nominating and electing a queen and king.  Our selections would be based not on popularity alone but who demonstrated superior commitment to pulling off the prom and dedication to the cause.  I was one of three male members on the prom committee and even though, in my opinion, I may have done a lot to help further things along, very few wanted to come forward and say it when it came down to it.  I just wasn't the perfect choice.  I wasn't a sports star.  I wasn't the hot guy.  I wasn't the most popular or had the most money.  I was just the guy who saw a problem and did his best to help fix it the best way he knew how.  One of the guys did come forward and say. "Hey, what about him?  He did the most."  Of course, I don't know whether he was being sarcastic and demeaning but I wasn't about to kiss anyone's ass for the recognition.  I knew what I did and deep down, everyone did as we got a lot of compliments on how everything turned out.   I would just have to wait and see what happens come the announcement of king and queen during the prom.

We gathered in the cafeteria for hors d'oeuvres and then filed onto coach busses for our trip down to the Gateway Clipper ship.  As the night went on, I spent my time with my date and enjoyed myself thoroughly.  It was our senior year and a celebration of friendship and accomplishment for our previous 12 years of schooling.  It wasn't time to worry about trivial things like titles.   That is, until it came time to huddle around the dance floor as the coronation was about to get underway.  One of our committee members grabbed the microphone and announced that this year was going to be a little different in terms of deciding on who was going to get the crown.  Suddenly, I unwittingly gave into the warm feeling in my stomach.  "Perhaps, they did decide to make me King?"  I thought.  "Maybe, this was the unorthodox choice that was made."  I continued to get drunk on the feeling that I was about to become the big winner in all of this.  My dedication and commitment were about to pay off in spades.   I was Charlie Brown and I was about to finally kick that football.

"This year we decided to go untraditional and chose TWO QUEENS!" Cheers flooded the dance floor as they called up both Queens up to be crowned.  The silent sound of me screaming as I fly into the air after the football is pulled away fills my brain.  I think to myself, "God, I hope I didn't look like I was expecting to be named."  That was the decision, two Queens instead of a King.  Granted, if I had been playing Blackjack, I would have at least got my money back but this went more towards the disintegration of whatever dignity I had as a high school senior who got a chance to play with the cool kids.  I was reminded of my social status and put back into my place at the back of the cool bus.  The lesson learned was that no matter how much you try to fit in, no matter how well you think you've saved the day, in the end you are still you and they are still them.   Detention for The Breakfast Club is over and come Monday at school Andy doesn't associate with Brian and Claire doesn't hold hands with Bender.  This is not a John Hughes movie and you do not get popular from making a hot girl with your computer.  You are David Silver from season one of 90210, not season three.  You are Arnie Cunningham before the Plymouth Fury.  Consider yourself a Neo-Maxi-Zoom-Dweebie.  For you youngsters out there, that's Seth, Evan, and McLovin all rolled into one.

15 years later at least I can find humor in it.  In fact, maybe I should write a self help book for those whose shoulders held those who stood upon them to reach the crown.  I could fill volumes of how I have always been three seconds late to greatness.  I guess there are some people who still hold onto those little tiaras and crowns as a keepsake or reminder of when they were the pinnacle of high school existence.  Some have probably traded a crown for a paper hat.  In that I find comfort that I didn't base my entire life's success on one little footnote in the yearbook right next to National Honor Society and Honor Role 1,2,3.  After all, it was high school and it's not like I was kept from a high profile and prestigious job just because I could not include Prom King on my resume.  In fact, as time has gone on, the end of my resume has become like the vertical scrolling screens in Contra.  As I add more things to the top everything at the bottom falls below sight and dies as it slides off the screen.  Gone are the accomplishments from high school and the new training and educational achievements have taken their place.  In fact, I struggle to remember what I did in high school as some online applications have drop downs and fields to fill in information from those days.  Did anyone ever have another course of study other than Academic in high school?  In the end, it doesn't really matter what I did in high school as long as I had fun, which I did.  I consider high school one of those frozen in moment times where I was old enough to make some of my own decisions but young enough to not be responsible for them when they blew up in my face.  And as far as others perception of who I was, they see me as they want to see me, In the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions. But what we found out is that each one of us is a jock...

and an outsider,

and a drama nerd,

a rich kid,

and a Prom King.

Does that answer your question?  Sincerely yours, Mongo.

Just for laughs, here are a couple of YouTube vids of our 1993 Prom. Remember, this was 15 years ago. There was no Internet or digital video. And don't ask me about the lightning bolt. I have no clue, either.