A few days ago, a friend decided she wanted another tattoo. After doing some research, she came up with a great idea. She wanted to get the words “Stay Gold” inked somewhere on her body.

If you have no idea where that phrase came from; then I’m sorry, we cannot be friends. Please go away. I can’t even!

It’s only one of the most important words written in one of the most important books in American Literature.

“What book?” You ask. Even after I told you to go away and that we cannot be friends.

That book would be The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. A book we first read in junior high. It was a book about kids our age. It was a book we bonded over, discussed incessantly, and forced all our friends to read. It was also a book we realized had stayed with us for over 30 years. We were still discussing it. We still used “Stay Gold” when times got hard. And, we still used Dallas’s rallying cry; ” Let’s do it for Johnny man. We’ll do it for Johnny!” (Except, we never rallied people to avenge a friends death. It was usually to peer pressure someone into doing something stupid. Like, stealing the metal puck off the local bar’s bowling game.)

So, after realizing we both still held on to some very deep seated anger towards Francis Ford Coppola for messing up the film, we decided to reread the book. We were curious to see if it held up as adults. Would we still love Ponyboy and cry when Dallas is gunned down by the cops? Would we still identify with Greasers? Would we still hate the Soc’s?

We’ll find out! We started the book a few days ago. Between my day job and my somewhat of a social life, I hope to have the book read in about a week or two.

It’ll be interesting. I’ll write up my thoughts here. So keep a lookout.