St. Elmo's Fire

Jules, you know...this isn't real. You know what it is? It's St. Elmo's Fire. 

Electric flashes of light that appear in the dark skies out of nowhere. 

Sailors would guide entire journeys by it, but the joke was on them...there was no fire. 

There wasn't even a St. Elmo. 

They made it up. 

They made it up because they thought they needed it to keep them going when times got tough, 

just like you're making up all of this. 

We're all going through this. 

It's our time at the edge.

-Billy Hicks, St. Elmo's Fire

 Have you ever watched a movie a million times, but you never really got it? Like, you understand it's a good movie--enjoyable, excellent even--but you just weren't quite ready for it. And then one day, you watch it again...and suddenly it all makes sense. You feel totally different about it. It makes you have feelings. Maybe you even cry because it just all makes sense now.

Enter St. Elmo's Fire.

I've been watching St. Elmo's Fire since I was a kid. It was in the canon with The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, 16 Candles, Can't Buy Me Love, and Ferris Bueller's Day Off. All excellent films. All classics.

I watched St. Elmo's Fire last week for the first time since graduating college. And now it finally makes sense. It was much more sad this time around. More real.

This group of friends from college can't seem to hold it together in their "freshman year of life" like they did as students.

I always thought we'd be friends forever, Kirby laments.
Kevin answers: Yeah, well forever got a lot shorter all of a sudden. 

Been there. Our little group of four: Amy, Cameron, Dan Doar and me--I haven't spoken to them in over a year. We literally spent every day together. Chapel. Sonic runs. Guthrie Theatre at midnight. Spending all night sitting in our hallway watching "Where's the chapstick?" Youtube videos. I would go sit with them during History of Western Civ, even though I wasn't taking the class and it was my lunch hour. I'd rather listen to The Boss (Dr. Clyde Billington--that dude was hardcore. Leather jacket. Escalade. Such a boss) lecture a class I'd already taken and be with my friends then go eat lunch alone. Those were real, deep friendships. But forever sure got short after I graduated.

But graduating, moving on, becoming a real adult--that's good too.

Wendy says: Yeah... ya wanna know what's great? Last night I woke up in the middle of the night to make myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich....and ya know, it was MY kitchen, it was MY refrigerator, it was MY apartment...and it was the BEST peanut butter and jelly sandwich that I have had in my entire life.

The first few weeks when Brett and I were married, we'd come home and look around and say "We live here. This is ours. This is our life." It was such a new thing...like, this no longer my parents house. This isn't a dorm room where everything belongs to Northwestern. This is ours.

And of course, this is the movie where every girl fell in love with Rob Lowe. He's the bad boy with a sensitive side. He's the screw up of the group, still not sure of his place in the world outside of the university frat house. He's adorable (the scene where he's jamming on his saxophone at the bar in that yellow bat(?) tanktop...so wonderful. Plus the dangling earing. Obviously this is all made better by his current role as Chris Traeger on Parks and Recreation. Rob Lowe, I love your career.

He's funny, of course. His quips are well-timed, but more than that, he's relatable. He's THAT GUY. The one we all know. The one we want to like despite his mistakes. He makes us all feel better:

So you lost your job? I've lost twenty of them since graduation. Plus a wife and kid. And, in a new development this morning, a handful of hair in the shower drain. 

There are many more golden moments in this movie of course, but one I can't help but laugh at--even before I began writing endlessly on just how much I believe in marriage. Way back in 1985 they were debating this:

Kevin: Marriage is a concept invented by people who were lucky to make it to 20 without being eaten by dinosaurs. Marriage is obsolete.
Alec: Dinosaurs are obsolete. Marriage is still around. 

In real life, this story would not end as well as it does. The brunch they plan is probably realistic, except half the group would cancel or not show up. There would be more children getting in the way of plans. Jules would have likely overdosed in the apartment, Leslie wouldn't have been able to remain friends with both Kevin and Alec. She'd likely have gone back to Alec, because that life is safe, familiar, comfortable. Kevin wouldn't have had his article published--what obit writer gets a column?

But it's better this way. Even if you never stay close with all your college friends in real life, I'd like to think that somewhere this group is still meeting at St. Elmo's Fire.