I finished watching Hocus Pocus for the first time since I was young enough to go trick-or-treating.
And I noticed a pretty big plot flaw. But one that applies to most of our lives.
By the way, if you haven't watched the movie yet, there are spoilers ahead. Stop reading if you still want to experience the joyful tomfoolery only '90's children's Halloween films can provide.
The kind where "hell," "damn," and "bitch" were still considered acceptable dialogue for children.
So, three witches come back from the dead for one night. Their only hope to not turn to dust come sunrise is to brew a potion, feed it to a child, and suck the child's life force dry.
In the movie's endgame, one of our main characters (an eight-year-old girl) calls our main witch Winnifred Sanderson "ugly." Just before destroying the remaining potion and escaping.
The witches are left with enough potion for one child. And a spell had already been cast causing hundreds of children to sleepwalk to the witches' cottage. You could see the horde out the window, in fact.
But Winnifred decides that the child who needs to die to keep them alive must be the one who dared called her "ugly."
And so, despite victory being right there in their laps, the witches pursue the little name-caller.
They fail to administer the potion in time.
They all turn to dust when the sun rises.
The end.
I mean, talk about petty, right? Splitting hairs when death is on the line?!? And besides, couldn't they have sucked the life force out of an extra and then given themselves eternity to chase after the little name-caller?
And as with most silly moments and plot holes in movies, I thought to myself, "This could make a good blog post!"
I mean, when you think about it, we short change ourselves out of principle all the time.
How many friends do we never speak with again because we insist they wronged us? And they have to be the one to apologize to us first before we can be friends again?
And more often than not, it simply never gets resolved. We don't feel better. The disagreement is never resolved. The friendship is over, never to be rekindled.
But, hey...at least we have our principles, right? (He said sarcastically...)
Or, when we're working on a piece that's just too hard right now. Maybe we don't have the skills yet. Maybe we just don't have the practice time required to get it across the finish line.
But we keep going out of principle. That we don't give up on a project, ever.
And ironically, end up quitting piano because of it.
Principles are good to have. But, sometimes, we have to double check that we're not doing something stupid that will be our undoing.
Because as noble as principles may be, they also disappear when we do.