Another chapter from the Magical Misery Tour

My wife and I never go to the movies. We don't like crowds and we don't like to be required to be in a specific place at a specific time. So, we decided that we can wait for any film to come to a store near us where we can go to purchase it. We watch it, pass it on to Ellen's brother's family and ultimately donate it to the library.

Recently, we sat through "Batman - The Dark Knight." A lot of anticipation over this film in our house as we are big Batman fans and, sadly, big Heath Ledger fans. Well, Heath should win a posthumous Oscar, but the struggle between good and evil that went on in that film was so overwhelming that we began rooting for the forces of evil to win. And, as an aside, what's with Christian Bale's use of the Clint Eastwood stragulated gravel voice whenever he was wearing the cape and cowl?

I mention all of these things as a way of setting up the next installment from the Magical Misery Tour which deals with the many forces of peer pressure which I think do so much to negate heredity as a molder of people.

Read on carefully, Blog Rangers:

Almost all movies deal with the triumph of good over evil. The common twist is that the characters who carry the day are those least likely to do so. Movies perpetuate the idea that there is an inner strength within all of us. No matter how overwhelming the odds, some reserve of moral fortitude is released and the nerd becomes the champion. The artist Andy Warhol may have been talking about this phenomenon when he said, "Everyone is famous for fifteen minutes." Here's what I think: Andy Warhol and the movies are not always right.

I attended an advanced grade school. Everyone there had the potential to be an overachiever and that is why they were selected to be there. I can't comment on the details of the selection process, because it is lost to the ages due to my unwillingness to investigate its origins. However, most of us went on to bigger and better things than algebra, advanced English and woodworking could provide.

Richie Phillips was a member of our class as was Stephen Solomon. Richie was a redheaded kid with freckles who had the look and smell of a victim about him. Stephen Solomon was extremely short and very anti-social. These two guys had been selected under the same scholastic criteria as the rest of us, but, when a hierarchy is defined, not everyone is equal despite their inclusion in an elite group. Some will populate the top, some the middle and some will live out their stay on the bottom to serve the cruelty needs of the others above them. Richie Phillips and Stephen Solomon were relegated to the lowest rungs of our social hierarchy. I won't delineate the kid tortures we put these two through because memory, embarrassment and taste have banished them from my brain. However, there is no question that my behavior and that of my classmates would bend and shape these two fellows later in life. I think we all agreed that one would be a janitor and the other a child molester. However, we couldn't decide which one would be which.

In 1982, I attended my 20 year high school reunion. Stephen Solomon attended. Richie Phillips did not. Stephen Solomon graduated from high school at 5 feet 5 inches tall. He came to the reunion at just under six feet which was a major surprise and a testament to the medical theory regarding growth spurts in late puberty. Stephen Solomon was rich from the investment banking computer program he alone had written. He had a beautiful wife on his arm. Seeing him bolstered my faith in the movies. Richie Phillips never entered my brain.

The next day, as I was leaving the island where I grew up, I stopped at the toll booth on the causeway and 38 year old Richie Phillips collected my toll. Swallowing my surprise as I handed Richie a quarter, I asked him how he was. He looked right through me as if I wasn't there. It was probably the same look all of us gave him through the formative years whenever he summoned up the courage to speak. He continued his stare and told me he was fine. After an even longer pause, I told him my name. I wanted some sort of recognition although I still don't know why. He feigned recognition but the moment evaporated as the horn from the vehicle behind me broke the inertia holding me and my rented car in front of Richie Phillips.

I have thought about Richie Phillips and Stephen Solomon many times since that day. Did we produce a computer genius and a toll taker? Did we have anything to do with either of their fates? I do believe we abused them both equally. I want to believe that Stephen Solomon succeeded to spite us and, regrettably, I have to believe Richie Phillips succumbed to us. However, I am sure that for that short period of time on the causeway, Richie Phillips, safe in his toll booth, was taking toll of me.

What could he have been thinking?