Terms of Endearment

I should be sleeping, but I am not. I am tucked in and watching Terms of Endearment. Which has to be on my list of top 10 movies of all time. Even with Debra Winger, who I normally dislike in most roles.

The scene in which the Mother has "the talk" with her sons, just took place, and I swear it gets me every time. What does a dying Mother say to her small children? I have no idea. I have been privy to the scene more times than I care to recall.....

In fact I actually attended nursing school, at the hospital that Terms of Endearment was filmed at in Lincoln, Nebraska. And oddly enough, I spent a lot of time at the bedside of women on the Oncology Floor. Women trying to plan for their families, and especially their children's futures, knowing they would be gone soon. I can recall long conversations, actually Moms of children thinking out loud. And I recall most of those conversations being the same. Moms want the same things for children, when it comes down to it. But I could never quite take hearing all of it. I must have nodded a lot. Like I said I do not recall specifics. It was always heartbreaking. And I always felt I owed it to them, to listen, and nod with little in the way of tears, especially since most of the time these women sat strong and in good faith.

But this movie gets me EVERY time I watch it. And when Shirley McLaine delivers one of her final lines and says...

"I'm stupid, I am stupid. For some reason I thought it would be easy"....

Well she is right.

I am not sure how popular this movie is any longer, but I think Debra Winger and Shirley McLaine did a brilliant job. And if you have never watched this movie, you should. The story is timeless.