Nora Ephron

I was very saddened to hear about the passing of Nora Ephron last week.  Nora has been a woman whom I admire and have looked up to for years.  As a successful writer, director, and producer, Nora has touched my heart through her creativity in ways that I'll never forget. 

I first discovered Nora when I was in High School and saw When Harry Met Sally.  I loved the movie so much that I went out and bought the VHS tape. I would watch it over and over again until I knew the dialogue by heart.  It was smart and funny and I wanted to be just like Sally : ) Doesn't everyone order apple pie like that?

Sleepless in Seattle changed my life.  Seriously, it did.  I saw Sleepless in Seattle in the movies three times.  This was the first movie that I ever saw more than once in a theater.  I was enchanted by it.  It introduced me to so many things - Stardust by Nat King Cole, the romance of New York city, Cary Grant, and most importantly...the power of white, twinkling lights.  They are everywhere!  I viewed Sleepless in Seattle as a modern day classic.  A true love story that could easily have been seen in black and white fifty years ago. 

By the time You've Got Mail came along I finally figured out that Nora Ephron was responsible for all three of my favorite movies!  This is why they are all so similar - the white lights, the coffee shops, Harry Connick Jr. - I get it!  I had to find out more about her so I started reading her books.  After I finished Heartburn (my favorite of them all), I understood everything.  I love this woman!

{It's the same way my huband feels about Martin Scorcese movies.  I still don't understand how he can get all warm and fuzzy about them, but strangely enough he does.  It guess it's a guy thing.}

Anyway...

 

Nora Ephron has been with me through all stages of my life, from teenager, to wife, to mother.  I turn to her movies and books when I want to feel good. She makes me happy when I want to be happy and she makes me cry when I need that too.  She makes me feel like the world is full of romance and magic and there is a such a thing as destiny.  She tells us to follow our dreams because there IS a somewhere over the rainbow. What a legacy she has left for us. 

Right around the time I had begun thinking about doing a blog I saw the movie Julie & Julia - which of course is about Julia Child and a food blog - and was written and brilliantly directed by Nora.  I was inspired. Hello destiny and 100 posts later, here I am. 

Looking through videos on Youtube it's hard for me to pick just one clip to sum up Nora Ephron.  It's pretty impossible to pick a movie, let alone a scene, I love the most.  She wrote so many wonderful moments that I have seen over and over again it's like I've lived them (but I unfortunately I haven't : )

This is one of my all time favorites...gets me every time.

Thank you Nora Ephron.  You will forever be a part of my life.  xo