Getting There

The house is beginning to shape up, but there's still a lot to be done. Only one more week until Maddie goes back to school. We're both a little under the weather, so that's not really helping anything.

This past week, in the wake of the death of John Hughes, I've been thinking a lot about Lloyd Dobbler and Ferris Bueller and the athlete, the princess, the basket case, the criminal and the brain. I've been remembering that when I saw Pretty in Pink when I was 16, I was so happy when Molly Ringwald's character ended up with Andrew McCarthy's Blaine, the guy of her dreams. And how when I saw it again at 26, I thought she really blew it, because the Duckman was the real catch.

When Maddie gets a little older, it will be interesting to see if those movies still have something to say. She will be the target audience--the white, suburban teenager--only a couple of generations removed. Surely Lloyd and Ferris are timeless characters. And Samantha's crush in Sixteen Candles is one that will be repeated until the end of time. (I'm guessing that the writers of Hannah Montana came of age on John Hughes movies as well since Hannah/Miley's love interest share's the name of Samantha's--Jake Ryan).

I've read a lot of pieces on Hughes over the last few days, but the most personal one was this op-ed piece from the NT Times.

Gonna try to go close my eyes now. Maddie woke up from a bad dream and I haven't been able to drift back to sleep.