"Billy Liar" + Love

Happy Late Night, my Darling,

I hope all is well, cause I haven't seen you on FB for several days now, excepting the one concert photo you posted to your professional page. I suppose it could just be FB itself, and it's lousy logarithm for deciding what to show on my news feed, so if you have been posting, I've unfortunately missed it.

But usually something does show up, at least a current post or two, so that's why I say I hope all is well.

Tonight I watched a movie from Criterion called "Billy Liar" that I got from the library. It was made in 1963 by director John Schlesinger, and it fits in to a minor category of British films from that era that deal with rebellious youth. I am also reading the John Lennon biography which comes out of the same postwar period, and the author quotes Lennon, who later said that "America had 'teenagers' . In England there were only people (of different ages)". And he was right, because there was no such thing as young person's culture before the 1950s, really. Kids have always been kids, obviously, but they mostly conformed to society as they grew to adulthood, and they were conditioned to do so all through their schooling and upbringing. This was especially true in England, which must have been a somewhat stodgy place until rock and roll and Elvis came along, and then The Beatles exploded the youth culture.

Suddenly, young people had the desire to be individuals, to think for themselves and to be themselves, and Teenage Culture was born.

"Billy Liar" isn't an "Angry Rebel" film like the movies of James Dean, but is more of a take on the aimlessness of a certain type of young person in that era in England, when it was okay not to conform. Billy is a total nonconformist, or he wants to be, but he doesn't quite have the nerve to break away and live life on his own terms.

It's a classic movie, with a major-league character creating performance by Tom Courtenay, and it really captures what England must have been like in the early 60s, just as rock music was taking over the country.

No hike today, but I will try and get out there tomorrow.

I am thinking of you and missing you. Post if you can.

I Love You.  xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo  :):)