I admitted a deep, dark secret to some friends the other day. I felt much better afterwards, even though they gave me some grief for my transgression.

While I feel good about taking this step with some people close to me, I don’t know if I can bring myself to make the same admission here. With time, understanding and an opportunity to right this wrong, I might muster up the courage eventually.

We had somehow fallen into an online discussion about television and movies. I would say I don’t know how we ended up on the topic, but I know exactly how we did. We love television and movies.

What I don’t know is how the conversation pushed me to list the iconic American movies I have never seen. Trust me, it’s quite a list. Luckily, a few people made me feel better about my admission by baring their movie-not-watching soul a little bit.

                In this day and age, what you watch can sometimes define you. I make this mistake by sometimes even though I hate how haughty some people get when others don’t share their tastes.

Just the other day, my niece talked about how much she hated a comedy movie I really, really enjoyed last year. She and her husband couldn’t even get past the first 30 minutes of the film.

I had to hold back judgment on them because I wouldn’t like it if the movies I have not seen made them find me morally deficient. For the record, I don’t understand how they could not find the movie hysterical, but I’ll get over it.

When I looked at my list, I found one big explanation. I have known this about myself for a while and feel it justifies all my choices.

I like to laugh. My list of missed opportunities contains mostly dramas because I just don’t find myself drawn to dramatic productions regardless of how important other people tell me they are.

We all have limited time to devote to entertainment. I would love to do nothing and watch every movie and TV show which helps inform our cultural identity, but then I wouldn’t have enough time to solve each level of Angry Birds and take the occasional nap. Plus I might not laugh as much as I like to.

But I don’t want to wallow in my ignorance. I want to right this wrong even if I don’t think not seeing a classic movie is really a wrong in the first place.

I actually started this a couple of years ago when I dove feet first into the TV show “Mad Men.” Now I’m racing to finish watching the most recent season online before the new one starts later this month.

As I have catalogued briefly on my blog, I also have devoted a bunch of time to “Friday Night Lights,” a TV show I can’t believe I never gave a chance when it aired.

This just scratches the surface though. I want to whittle down the list of movies I’m almost embarrassed to say I only understand through quotes thrown around by other people. I want to see the context around those quotes.

I just might not be able to help you if you’re stuck on Angry Birds. I also might be tired if I can’t squeeze in a nap. But those are the sacrifices I will make to fully succumb to peer pressure.