tfw you realize you’re old but still gold
Okay, y’all’re gonna think the title is extra corny once you figure it out.
In related news, it just occurred to me that we’re only a few months out from the 40th anniversary of the movie The Outsiders. And if you’re of my generation (again, I plan to write a longer post about that sometime in the near future — but for now, suffice it to say I mean all y’all Americans & Europeans in your early 40s to mid-50s) and that fact doesn’t make your joints feel a li’l creaky, then I dunno what to do with you.
The book by S.E. Hinton is even older, of course, pushing 60. I first read it in school in 9th grade? 10th? I can’t remember. It was in the early- to mid-’90s, anyway, about 25 years after the book’s publication and 10 or so years after the movie’s release. I remember thinking the book felt very relatable, and it didn’t read like something published in the ’60s. I was especially happy that it was set in Oklahoma, so that my German friends could get a little taste of what my other “home culture” was like. Even if it wasn’t all positive in the book.
I also remember trying to talk our English teacher (who, of course, was also German) into pronouncing Socs “so-shiz” instead of “socks.” He didn’t go for it. (Sorry, Herr Stadler, I’m still right.)
When we finally watched the movie in class, I got hit all in the feels, of course. I’m pretty sure the whole class sobbed through the final twenty minutes. And I was at the perfect age for developing massive crushes on Matt Dillon and Patrick Swayze. (Rob Lowe was in the running, too, but that crush didn’t fully develop until I watched him in The Stand not long after.)
And now it’s nearly 40 years since they filmed it. Look at these babies.
I haven’t read the book or watched the movie in at least 20 years. I’m thinking I’ll do both next year in honor of the 40th. Nostalgia and all that, but I’m also curious to see how the story holds up in these our 2020s. Based on what I remember, my guess is: fairly well? There’s gonna be some misogyny from the “good guys” that would not fly in any critically received book or movie these days (and that’s as it should be). But I don’t remember if they explore or redeem that at all.
Anyway, just a few random thoughts. I can’t believe it’s nearly 40.
P.S. Also? It seems the book is on multiple banned book lists? ALL THE MORE REASON TO RE-READ. My copy is in the shelf that my kiddo gets to start choosing from as soon as she hits teen years. BOOM. As LeVar Burton says,
“Read the books they’re banning. That’s where the good stuff is. If they don’t want you to read it, there’s a reason why.”
Now *that* man is gold.
P.P.S. Sorry my captions aren’t centered. I tried to fix it, but it functioneth not.