Not the Consolation Prize

Posted on August 24th, 2015

On a cross-country flight last week, I decided to rewatch an old favorite. My dad will openly admit to being a huge fan of romantic comedies, particularly of the Nora Ephron variety, so watching them is majorly sentimental for me. Sleepless in Seattle and You’ve Got Mail are constantly on television, and I’m pretty sure we didn’t miss a single showing. The Billy Crystal/Meg Ryan combination got less airtime than the Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan counterparts, but I think When Harry Met Sally is my most beloved of the bunch.  (But don’t get me wrong– I’ll watch Sleepless in Seattle and You’ve Got Mail any day of the week, too)

I will provide a high-level synopsis for those unfamiliar, and while it will give some spoilers, it’s the kind of movie where you can guess the whole plot three minutes in. Sally and Harry first meet when they roadtrip from University of Chicago to New York City after graduation. They quarrel for much of the eighteen hour drive, which is unsurprising given Sally is uptight but cheerful and Harry is a little pessimistic when it comes to interpersonal relationships and human dynamics. They run into one another several years later, each happily paired with significant others, and still don’t get along particularly well. Fast forward a little bit more and we’re ten years beyond their initial roadtrip meeting, but at this moment in their lives, they become fast friends. And then, naturally, comes love.

There several themes here that I love to see getting some attention, the first of which is the transition of a friendship into a beautiful romance. There is absolutely something to be said for becoming involved with someone with whom you already have shared experiences, and whose behaviors and opinions you have gotten to know ahead of time to a degree. I admit to being biased in this regard. On the one hand, I hate the unknown, so I love the idea of having some baseline information on hand right out of the gate. On the other hand, I have had two serious relationships in my life, and in the first we were friends for ten years before we started dating, and in the second it took six years. Assuredly worth the wait!

I would like to preface discussion of the second theme with an unromantic confession: I don’t really believe in soulmates, or this idea that there is only one person who is our perfect match in this world. In When Harry Met Sally, our “lovers” interact with one another several times before they even like each other as people, let alone fall in love. Nora Ephron doesn’t try to write this off with some major character development, and no one gets a personality transplant– it’s just about the series of distinct events at a specific moment in time that happen to lead to the successful chemistry. It’s an exciting truth, and a reminder of the benefits of keeping an open mind.

The transition from platonic friend to significant other is certainly fraught, but when the conditions are right, it is certainly rewarding.  When it comes to love…

I’ll have what she’s having.