Happy Birthday Dirty Dancing!

Twenty-five years ago this coming Tuesday, one of my all-time favorite movies opened in theatres. And when I say it's a favorite of mine, I really do mean it. I once watched it six times in one night.

No, that isn't a typo. I was a very obsessive child.

You see, I couldn't watch it in the theatre. I only discovered the wonder that is Dirty Dancing once it came out on video. And I was hooked.

Ask just about any woman around my age and they'll tell the same tale -- the first time they watched Dirty Dancing was at a sleepover party. In my case, it was my friend Becca's birthday party. (To this day, I still remember her mom telling me that all she wanted for Christmas was Patrick Swayze in a Christmas stocking. But I digress.)

Anyway, Becca's mom had rented a number of movies more suitable for a gathering of 10-and-11-year-olds, but of course none of us wanted to watch them. No, we wanted to watch that movie that none of our parents would let us see. (Of course, we didn't know WHY they wouldn't let us watch it, but the mere fact that it was off-limits was enough to make us insanely curious.)

So we did what all self-respecting tweens who are determined to rebel do -- we lied when Becca's mom asked if we had our parents' permission. I mean, it's not like they explicitly said we couldn't watch Dirty Dancing at Becca's house that particular night. (Not actually asking probably had something to do with that...) And after all, it had been a good four months or so since our parents had forbidden us from seeing it in the theatres. In tween years, that was practically a decade, so we'd obviously matured since then, right?

In the twenty-five (wow, has it really been that long?!) years since, I've probably watched it around a hundred times or so. And yes, I can quote verbatim. Your point?

A couple of weekends ago I was flipping channels and found it playing on cable, so of course I had to watch. (Not that I needed to wait for it be shown on cable since I own it on DVD, but whatever.) And although she was mostly watching Dora the Explorer on her own portable DVD player, my toddler (2 going on 21) was in the room, so she kept looking up at the TV from time to time to watch the dancing. And of course she followed along and demonstrated the choreography. (Thankfully the more, shall we say, erotic dance scenes had already passed by the time I'd stumbled upon the showing.)

Yes, I watched Dirty Dancing with my preschooler. Don't judge.

Anyway, now she's totally obsessed with the iconic water lift and always wants her daddy to lift her in the pool. It's totally cute.

Maybe we should go down to Lake Lure, NC this weekend for the 3rd annual Dirty Dancing Festival. My little girl is so tiny and weighs just about nothing, so she's sure to be a shoo-in to win the water lift contest. She probably wouldn't do all that well in the watermelon carrying race. But that's okay.

And tonight is the lakeside Dirty Dancing screening.

What does a small town in the North Carolina mountains have to do with this movie? Easy -- Lake Lure was where they filmed it, because it looks like the Catskills and it's much cheaper than Upstate NY.

I'm not going to have time to make it to NC, but I'll definitely be watching at home tonight. And having the time of my life. Because nobody puts Baby in the corner.