What Was I Doing Then?

I was glancing at CNN the other night, and they had a clip from National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. The parenthetical date after the title made my head swim--1989.

Holy Moses. That was that long ago?

Not only does that put the original Vacation's release in ancient times, but that means it's nearly 20 years since I went with my buddy and his dad to see the holiday sequel.

Holiday movies are, of course, part of the season, and wedged in after shopping or holiday activities, when it's time to see a movie to avoid fist fights with the relatives.

Movies in general are often reference points, auld lang sine's in their own right, and holiday movies or holiday releases often make me think of absent friends.

Kiss Me Goodbye, I know from imdb.com, was a 1982 release. From memory, I know it was December. My college buddy Lee and I dropped in to see it at the mall cinema. Lee picked that one. Don't know why he was gung ho to see it, but it was pretty good.

It was my buddy David that I went to see the Christmas Vacation film with. He and I went to see Star Trek IV the Thanksgiving it opened also and Starman around Christmas of '84.

Rain Man was a date movie on New Year's Eve the year it opened, part of a holiday romance that lasted a while but not forever. Saw Scrooged with the same girl around Christmas the same year. Seem to remember Steve Martin's Pennies from Heaven as another holiday date movie earlier in the '80s.

I remember Jackie Brown as an outing with my then boss, Wes. Christine and I, he and his wife plus Pam Grier and Robert Forester, now wowing as an uber-villain in Heroes. Time flies.

Yep, time flies.

To absent friends.