The more things change...

I wasn't alive in 1968 when Bobby Kennedy was shot. All the history books I read in school seemed to jump from 1964 to 1974, so before seeing the movie I didn't really know much about him other than the fact that he was a Kennedy and therefore he probably rocked. But I did finally watch, and very much appreciate, Bobby. Liberal bias and Rehab Queen aside, it was very well cast and well directed and well shot (no pun intended) and... Well, it made me kinda sad, actually. I don't feel like we've come very far in 40 years. It feels like as technology advances at warp speed, societal progression slows down. And I don't just mean in the "can't talk - text messaging" sense of it, I mean in the grand scheme of things - The-Man-keeping-people-not-like-himself-down sense of it. I know that adding a post-1968 human rights montage at the end would've been cliche, but that's all that was running through my head after I watched the movie. I'll have to ask my parents where they were when he was killed. And slightly unrelated but not so much, I've REALLY gotta see A Day Without A Mexican.

I was eight years old when The Big Chill came out. But on a whim I watched that last night. All those liberal arts self-righteous college kids who ended up in mainstream society, feeling sad and lost and lonely and unfulfilled... For a brief moment it made me appreciate my life, seeing as how I'm on the rebound from the corporate world. But then today I sat in a random meeting with people in my line of work, and I was kinda stunned to realize that none of them were wearing wedding rings. I chalked it up to the fact that they were all gay just to make myself feel better, but somehow the movie intertwined with the meeting and I walked out wondering if anyone was really, truly happy. An odd day followed.

And now I'm going to watch Kramer Vs Kramer, because my oldest friend raves about that movie, and I imagine I will cry at the appropriate scenes and appreciate the Oscar-worthiness of the movie, and then be left wondering why people bother to get married and what the meaning of life is all about.

Welcome to my Friday night! Good thing I have a full bottle of wine to accompany this viewing.