Going to the Movies

It has been awhile since Cora and I have had a chance to go to a movie together. I think we last saw Million Dollar Baby, but coordinating that night out was like a strategic military operation for an invasion of a small country. We had to incorporate two-star generals to successfully pull it off. When you have five children, nothing is spontaneously arranged anymore. It requires days or weeks of planning.

Technology is a good thing. It's nice to know that you can purchase your movie tickets in advance and on the internet. The old way of getting movie tickets was always a frustration, but as a seasoned married couple, we were good at it. You can actually split up responsibilities:

"Honey, I'm gonna park the car, you get out and buy the tickets...I'll meet you in line."

We were a precision drill team.

"Okay, you get in the ticket buyer's line. I will park the car, come around the northwest corner and get in the ticket holder's line. I'm at the ticket holders', you're at the ticket buyers'. Now, at nineteen hundred hours, the doors will open and I'll have to move out. My regiment is leaving. If I don't have tickets in hand, we're dead. Get me those tickets. Now cover me....I'm going in!"

Of course, this type of expertise doesn't happen overnight; it takes months and months of Friday nights to practice. You must each accept that there is a job to be done and sacrifices to be made. There is no romance involved; it's all business. "Tonight, we'll see a movie, tomorrow we'll kiss. Now get out of the car and go go go go GO!"

Couples just starting out don't know this. Ever see first-date couples at a weekend movie? No. Because they never get in. They haven't developed this taste for blood. They're too busy holding hands, being polite, "Which movie would you rather see? Because if you'd rather see something else......Oh, look, everything seems to be sold out."

Of course it's sold out! It's Friday, eight o'clock. Separate! Split up! Do your jobs, be nice to each other afterward.

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Even when you get into the theater, it's not over. You have to get seats. Now, again, there is a science to this. You walk into the theater, grab the first two seats you see. Doesn't matter where they are, and you may very well not sit there, but grab them! That's your fallback position.

One of you guards the fall back position, while the other one goes to look for better seats. You set out in the jungle with a machete and a map, and periodically throw your gaze back to the fallback position, secure in the knowledge that, at worse, you've got two sucky seats in the front waiting for you.

To find better seats, you have to bother other people. You see a guy next to a jacket. "Excuse me, is that seat taken?" You have to ask, because you don't know. Is he saving it? Is he dating his clothing? It's not always clear.

Sometimes you see a jacket and a hat. He's waiting for two friends. Once in awhile, you see a trail of clothing: jacket, hat, shoes, pants, socks, underwear, tie clip, belt....and way down at the end there's one guy sitting there naked and embarrassed. "Yes, they're all coming back. We're a group of twelve....I undressed. I didn't think this through. Do you mind moving on? Please!"

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When you've found your seats, it's still not over. One of you has to go back out to get the popcorn. That's usually my job. I'm happy to do it, but there's no moment more embarrassing than when you come back into that dark theater and realize you don't know where you're sitting. Suddenly, you're 4 years old and lost at the circus. You're near tears: "Honey? Honey?...." You're sitting in people's laps: "Sorry, wrong row..... Honey, where are you? I got the popcorn you wanted....."

If you can't find the seats, you've got to go to the front row and walk up the entire aisle, in plain view of everyone, hoping your partner will see you and come to your rescue. Of course, they're watching the movie at this point, and the last thing they're thinking about is you.

So you're wandering up and down the aisle like an idiot. "Help me....somebody....don't you see I'm dying here?" You're standing in front of a crowd with your arms full of crap you didn't even want. "Someone pull me out of this hell!"

You bump into other guys who are just as lost.

"Honey?!"
"Babe?!"
"Sweetheart?!"
"Hey, my wife is 'sweetheart.'"
"Sorry.....HONEY?"

That's all you hear; men whining, and women whispering men's names loudly.

"Steve! Steve!"
"Leonard!"
"Mitchell! I'm over here!"

It's pathetic! In this situation, my advice is....sit next to any woman, it doesn't matter who. Just level with her. "Look, Mitchell is not coming back. I just saw him go into the wrong theater, so he won't be back for some time. My wife is sitting with a guy named Steve, Steve is with Leonard's wife...it's all screwed up. But I'm a guy, I got popcorn, it's the same exact thing. Tell me what I missed....what's happened so far?"

You watch the movie and you settle up afterward.