Christmas Aesthetic 1997

25 years ago today, sixteen-year-old me went to Sunday morning church in Baton Rouge, ate lunch, hung out at my cousin Adrian's house. I started formulating a plan to go to the movies that night, and managed to rope in most of the people I knew. Most of my female immediate and extended family members, along with female family friends went to see Titanic, while I and several male members and friends went to see a showing of Tomorrow Never Dies that started around the same time. This was opening weekend for both films, and the old Corporate Boulevard Citiplace Theater was packed.
My cousin and best friend, Adrian, was supposed to come to Tomorrow Never Dies, but Elizabeth Sleger asked him to go to Titanic, and he always did what Elizabeth Sleger asked, so he went with the girls. Tomorrow Never Dies was solid, not great, but we all needed rides home from our Titanic-watching moms, so after James Bond's 18th Eon cinematic adventure ended, we snuck into Titanic and stood in the back. Somehow, Titanic was only halfway over, and the ship had just hit the iceberg, so we watched the rest of what ended up being a much bigger movie than Tomorrow Never Dies from the shadows.
Then I went home and played Mario 64, which I had just bought with some birthday money, and ate from a large jar of Hershey's Assorted Minis, which I won from a youth group Christmas party game the night before. I also made sure to put my new neon orange Louisiana Hunter's Safety card into my wallet, as Adrian and I had spent the past Friday night and Saturday morning at the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, taking classes and shooting skeet to get our passing grades.
Four days later, I got an IOU from my mom for Goldeneye for my Nintendo 64, as it was a hot commodity in the Christmas of 1997, and all the local stores were out of stock. However, I had rented the game on Christmas Eve and still had bloodshot eyes from playing it all night. What a game! A few days later, in Lutcher, Louisiana, I accomplished my only high school basketball double-double (10 points and 600 rebounds), which came with a caveat--my coach snuck me into a 9th grade game, as we were playing a nationally renowned team of 14-year-olds. We lost 90-30, but I had fun. On the way home, I talked to my younger teammates about Titanic and Tomorrow Never Dies, and how I was going to try to see the rest of Titanic in a few days, which I did. That me was as joyful, optimistic, and carefree as I've ever been in my life, unaware of a dark year ahead that would forever alter my path. But for that weekend, for that month, and for that year, I was as young and happy as a barnacle on the Titanic. What a time to be alive.