Pondering

 Just pondering.

I was... eleven years old when I experienced the revelation of Ripley on a drive in screen in the San Fernando Valley in the summer of 1979.

I was breaking a few rules. First, my two buddies and I had snuck in to the drive in. Bad enough.

Foremost, though, there was no way in Hell my parents would have let me see this on purpose, so seeing it without their permission was the topper, and I knew I was doing something wrong.

I expected to receive my karmic punishment in the form of violent, gory nightmares, the usual poetic come-uppance for pre-teen moviehouse transgressions (you can't tell your folks why you're having those nightmares because you'd have to admit you broke the rules!).

But I did not expect, could not have possibly foreseen, what I ended up getting.

Her.

It was not this next scene, though I suppose I must say this part was nice after so much tension, and I might as well get this one out of the way because everyone loves this one and it has to come up sooner or later:

Fine, but no, it wasn't that. Even at 11 going on sex-too-early I knew this wasn't the remotest reason why I fell so hard.

It was this.

Damn.

And this, as she asserts the only decision that would have saved the rest of their sorry asses if they'd listened.

And oh this perfect Ripley look.

She didn't look, speak or behave like any woman I'd ever seen in a movie or on television.

She didn't look, speak or behave like any woman I'd ever seen -- period.

She was tall, lanky, dirty, sweaty, she wore no makeup. She was strong, controlled, smart. She swore like a trucker.

She was just fucking REAL.

She smoked these yellow cigarettes and drank what must have been total crap coffee while pushing buttons to talk to pain in the ass co-workers and put up with the same bullshit we all experience at our jobs and she didn't once, not once, make a decision that was nearly as stupid as any of her crew, superior officers (especially) included.

Yeah. You bet I fell.

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So.

This part of cyberspace is dedicated to Warrant Officer Lt. Ellen Ripley, and to my lifelong admiring love of her brilliance.

I suppose, then, it is also dedicated to the incredible Sigourney Weaver, but really, I can only deal with one madness at a time, and Sig's got hundreds of pages dedicated to her.

I guess Ripley does too. But... none of them are this one. 

This one's all mine.

My musings over this lifelong Muse, are what this digital couch-and-shrink are about.

I suppose there might be better ways to exercise and exorcise my 30+ year old lovesick fascination for this incredible woman.

I mean, the title alone might not be wishful thinking.

But I think this is the only way to be sure.

-SIGNING OFF-