Warning: The entire first half of this story will feel like one long digression. Stay with me.
After a particularly awful Friday that came at the end of a week when the world seemed to be looking for more and more ways to beat me up, I came home today knowing that at some point in the evening, I was going to cry. Sometimes you have days when it's not so much a matter of if you're going to cry as when you're going to cry. In my job, I sometimes have to write about things that are just unbelievably sad. When I was at my first job, I would frequently break down crying at work over these stories, prompting my editor, a very kind man who, like many men, is totally freaked out by crying women, to say to me "Rice, there is no crying in JOURNALISM!" in imitation of Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own saying "Are you crying? Are you CRYING? There's no crying in baseball!" These days, I am able to keep myself from crying over sad stories most of the time while I am physically in my office. I'm not sure if I'm growing as a professional or if I'm just that hardened after three years of sad stories. But the thing that keeps me from despairing over my jaded soul is that I do still cry. I think if I ever reach the point when I am incapable of feeling pain for someone in pain I will know I have been doing this too long.
So on the Friday evening in question, I came home knowing that a crying jag was going to be a part of the evening. I told Dan that his options were to stay home and watch me cry or go out and do something less depressing. To be truthful, I was not in a frame of mind to be good company. Dan, knowing me like he does and understanding that sometimes the best thing he can do for me is just give me some space and some time, left the house. So it was that I spent a Friday evening with Steel Magnolias, a movie I never watch unless I am in the mood to bawl like a baby. And let me tell you, that is what I did. I am not ashamed to say that by the time Julia Roberts was lying in a coma with Sally Fields by her side, I was on my couch, with one hand in a bag of chocolate and another hand clutching wads of Kleenex, wearing a T-shirt that was drenched from the collar to half-way down the chest with tears. And these were not "Oh, isn't that sad," tears. These were huge, sobbing,snot-dripping-from-your-nose kinds of tears. I am not an attractive movie closeup kind of cryer. When I really get going, my face swells up and gets red and I look just exactly like a tomato for a good twelve hours. But I just didn't care. By the time Julia Roberts was dead and Sally Fields was standing by her grave screaming at her friends, I was just pouring tears. But then, that great Steel Magnolias moment happened, when Sally Fields screams "I just want to hit something! I want to hit someone until they feel as bad as I do!"
And Olympia Dukakis grabs Shirley McLaine and shoves her in front and says "Here! Hit Ouiser! Take a swing, M'lynn! Half the town would give their eye teeth to take a swing at Ouiser!" And everyone laughs, except Shirley McLaine, who looks at Olympia Dukakis and says "You are a pig from hell." And then I laughed and laughed and laughed. And I felt so much better.
So tonight, I thank the Lord for Steel Magnolias. Because sometimes, you just need to cry. But sometimes you need to laugh, too.
What movie can you always count on to make you cry or laugh?