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Recently, during casual conversation, lingering at the table after a delicious meal, the challenge was issued to name our top five favorite movies. I asked if we were talking pre WWII or post? Nope, just the top favorite all-time-no-qualifiers-allowed movies. Even as bad as the film industry has declined over the years, if you take a minute to think about it, you will discover, as we did, how difficult this is.

Five is a small number when you are using it to rank hundreds, maybe thousands of flicks. I was the first to announce my top five, although I know the list would change if ever I was asked this again. But for the sake of not drifting off to sleep from too much food and the lull in the conversation, I said, number five, the first William Powell Thin Man movie, number four, The first Pink Panther movie, number three, Raising Arizona, number two, Mr. Holland's Opus and my all time favorite movie that I could see once a week is Ground Hog Day.

To my surprise, my choices initiated animated rebuttal. It seems there are serious camp divisions over Raising Arizona and just like coconut, you either really like it or you really don't. But everyone generally agreed that Ground Hog Day was a good choice, if maybe not for the blue ribbon position. Then, I was forced to consider why Ground Hog Day, certainly not an Academy Award candidate, made it to my number one slot. Well, yeah, Bill Murray is a great comic performer and you can truly get into his characters. But I'm thinking the part could have been played by others equally as well. Tom Hanks, for example. And then, of course, I did love the setting in a small town; this is always a winner for me. But, overall, the real reason I love this movie is the whole concept of having absolutely all the time you need to do whatever you want. Furthermore, there's the hook that reels you into the storyline.

The guy is such a jerk and before it is over he has learned all the valuable lessons of life, while he still has the rest of his life to use them. Now that's one you can file under "never happens in real life". And that's what makes the whole thing so appealing. Not only does it feed into my insatiable need to have more time to do what I want to do, it also allows me to wallow in the fantasy of getting my lessons early on so I can just spend the rest of my life basking in wisdom and reaping the rewards of good choices and righteous living.

So, that's it then. The crux of the matter is not only about having enough time to learn how to speak another language or play an instrument. It is more about graduating quickly and getting on with life, armed with good character, depth, compassion, patience, sincerity, honesty, and a high emotional IQ. The remaining journey down the yellow brick road would have to be less difficult with all those skills tucked inside your tote.

Right?

Alas, life is not a movie. And while life occasionally imitates art, the tote we start with is pretty much empty. It's all the troubles and near misses we encounter on the way that help us begin to fill it up. And unlike the illusion of the movies, we are indeed lucky if we "get it right" before we hit the last scene of the final act.

Unfortunately, being real instead of fictional characters, more often than not, we pick up the wrong lessons along the way like bitterness, pettiness, revengefulness, jealousy, self-pity and self-centeredness. And when our final credits roll, it's too late. Fini. The End. Time's up. No reruns. Too bad life can't be a movie, huh?