The Legend of Billie Jean

I got a new car (Honda Pilot) but it doesn't have a cd changer like my old car (Honda Civic - viva la Honda!!!) and I don't really like those visor cd holders so changing cds is often tricky enough that I don't so I starve for good radio. Even though I work less than 10 minutes from home, that can be a looooooooooong 10 minutes. So in my exploring of the dial today I stumbled upon and yes, even listened to (call me what you will), Pat Benatar's Invincible from the motion picture The Legend of Billie Jean which I believe was Christian Slater's first film role. Granted, the movie lacked (to say the least) but I was in my first year of college growing up in Corpus Christi, TX where the movie was filmed for some reason, as was Brooke Shields' Tilt - for a moment Corpus Christi was thought to be a great locale and trust me, growing up there I had no idea why anyone would think such things - sure we had a beach but it had brown sand and was often marred by many an oil slick - but baby oil will get that off the soles of your feet lickity-split! But I digress....

As I was saying the movie was filmed there and there was supposed to be this pivotal, Joan of Arc scene where Billie Jean (played by Helen Slater) shaves her head sans the requisite (for the time) rat tail and so a whole bunch of girls in the town were to shave their heads to fight The Man or The Power or whatever oppression plagued poor BJ (heh, heh, I typed BJ) so there were all these people trying to convince you to shave your head and thus embrace immediate fame while being an extra in the movie. I knew NO ONE that did except for this one girl in my art history class (a class that sounds fun and interesting but turns looking at Art into some weird biology dissecting experiment - Mona Lisa Smile my class was not). But if you saw this girl, a girl actually interested in the class and perhaps the major and ensuing Master's, and as stereotypically broody as a girl could be taking an art history class at Corpus Christi's only community college, you would think she'd be the last person to succumb, and yet... she didn't, she shaved, she embraced no fame, and I think she ended up on the cutting room floor. I hope she's in a far better place right now.

So yeah, that's what launches into in my head when I hear Pat Benatar's Invincible.

We can't afford to be innocent
Stand up and face the enemy
It's a do or die situation
We will be INVINCIBLE!

Dramatic words for Miss Benatar, no? Now if only she would leave my head....go on now, SHOO! I'll stand up when I'm good and ready, now GO!