When I was a kid, I loved teen movies. I ate them up — Sixteen Candles, Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, Some Kind of Wonderful. When I was 12, 16, or 22 I was pretty sure that love would be just like in these movies. I was sure Heidi Homecoming and Quinton Quarterback would stay in love forever and ever. I spent many a day and night pining for the kind of love between Andi and Blaine, Keith and Watts, Ronald and the girl he paid $1000 to be his girlfriend for a month. Having never gone on a single date my entire teenage career, these movies were all I knew of teen love.

I still love those movies (even the post-80s ones). I think I love them even more now, because I know that Heidi started kissing her freshman roommate after her first party in the dorms. Somehow knowing that there is no happily ever after for these characters makes the movies more enjoyable. Does that make me bitter?

Incidentally, I watched “Some Kind of Wonderful” and for the first time I finally got the Rolling Stones connections. Amanda Jones, Keith, Watts, duh. I think I might have been the dumbest teenager in the history of the world.