Here's to the Mustache, Man. Reflecting on a Childhood Where Cannonball Run Mattered.

Rest in Peace, Burt.

I am thinking about my days in Clay, New York when my father had control of the cable box, and all the channels were downstairs in his man cave. For my sisters and me, this meant we only got to watch Gilligan's Island and other cable shows when he wasn't watching t.v. himself (aka sleeping). These were days where HBO and a big brown box with a long chord meandered through his man cave with a row of numbers to press, and three dials to select which row you wanted to watch. You'd sit on a chair and punch plastic knobs to get a show to entertain you.

When I learned that Burt Reynolds passed, I first thought of his mustache (and my father's occasional mustache - which I'm unsure was inspired by Burt Reynolds or episodes of M*A*S*H) and then I thought about the movie Cannonball Run. I absolutely loved that movie and now want to view it again. As a middle school kid with too much time on his hands, I simply remembering watching that film over and over again (there's a scene, I believe, where two women in a sport's car distract the police officer by, well, showing a little too much of themselves...this was fantastic to a middle school boy and I was mesmerized).

I also remember, however, the outtakes of the film...a first in a movie tradition to exit the credits with bloopers and silly comedy (now I watch for insight for new releases and clues to the future). Then, however, it was to laugh and to see that the actors and actresses were human, too).

Rewatching the outtakes, though, I realize how quickly time has gone and how fast a generation disappears. I don't think friends and I talked about Cannonball Run, but the movie, I'm sure, was instrumental to our upbringing.

I guess we knew of Loni Anderson on WKRP in Cincinnati and then the Sally Fields connections, but that was adult gossip. For kids, it was about the fast laugh and the introduction into adulthood.

He was a stud. A masculine icon who, in today's day and age, would unlikely get a call back for a part in any film. But then, he was the poster child for young boys to look up to. I appreciated his humor most, and I can hear the laughter of Dom Deluise ringing like bells in my afternoons before little league baseball and riding 10 speed bikes with my friends.

Funny how a loss triggers such memories. I told a friend last night that I imagine such memories will be triggered on a daily basis as I get older, as the magic of Hollywood that dazzled our childhoods, simply gravitates to the inevitable.

I do have to see Cannonball Run again, especially to see if the laughs hold up to what my middle school mentality remembers. That's entertainment for ya! We remember the moments (the films and the figures) who helped us to escape reality for a while. That film was one of them, and that is what I am thinking about when thinking about Burt Reynolds.