Back when I was little, I fretted about existential crises, like would I be required to smoke cigarettes as a grown-up, or, how, or, more importantly, why, one would find a wife to love me when that time came. At 7, I worried about my career (bounty hunter or symphony orchestra leader), China dropping the A-bomb, bullies, or a solitary impure thought gently wafting in minutes after confession and an eon before tomorrow’s Holy Communion.
Through broken hearts, bills overdue or fretting about — yet again — falling short of becoming myself, there were The Movies. What a profoundly beautiful parenthesis, two hours stolen and no 12-ton personal devil sitting next to me. Darkness. Air conditioning. When the pockets were jingling, there was even popcorn, a hot dog, Milk Duds and an ice cold Coca-Cola with that satisfying slosh of crushed ice. In my early years, the extra-large size came close to my actual bodily capacity.
These past few weeks? I’m in heaven. My daughter’s a senior at a snooty and ancient New York university and home for August. After chores or road trips, we begin our evenings with dinner in front of the TV and will watch a movie. Or three. OK. Sometimes, four. I remember her first. Indiana Boston was 5. Her mom and I were separated. She ix-nayed any media until our daughter’s 44th birthday, but, my hearing has always been wickedly selective. It was back in the day of Blockbuster, when you had to climb into the car, drive to a video store, wander down aisles and rent a motion picture. For 99 cents. Today? I’ve bought cars for less than my monthly subscriptions to Amazon Prime, Netflix and YouTube and STILL have to pay four bucks to rent a darn film.
We had matching denim couches in the living room back then at our Iron Canyon rancho. The little divan was called, “The Safety Couch.” Our forever deal? I told my effervescent little relative that if she could somehow make it onto The Safety Couch, she was safe from any creepy monster, polar bear, all woes or parental consequences. Some of my fondest memories are running at full-speed after her, down our long hallway. Indy had this neat toy inflatable giant plastic hammer that squeaked and she’d madly hightail it toward the living room, me a breath behind, pounding the carpet behind her heels. Squeak!! Squeak!! Squeak!! Yards from the sanctuary sofa, she’d go airborne. I’d circle, giant red-and-yellow mallet behind my back, assuring, like Dracula, that if she’d only slide off The Safety Couch to the carpet, all was safe. The first movie she ever saw was, “The Parent Trap.” The original, with Haley Mills “… and Haley Mills!!” as the original 1961 Disney movie ads lured. Indy still sucked her thumb and held onto her belly button, a habit she’d eventually outgrow before university. All cozy, she leaned back against a fortress of cushions. A minute into the film, she looked over at me and offered the most overly enthusiastic thumbs-up. Her smile filled the room.
Certainly no offense to Christianity, but I’ve escaped often to the dark chapel of cinema. In my early years were delightful fillers like newsreels and cartoons, kitschy advertisements featuring dancing corn dogs and merry overflowing tubs of popcorn. Dear hope beyond hope were Previews of Coming Attractions. I loved the previews. It was an assurance. No matter what size my problems, love would win out, civilization would advance. Wednesday mornings, I’d sprint to grab the soggy morning paper. That’s when the movie lineup refreshed. Gender-wise, I’m as straight as Interstate 5 past Bakersfield. But, at 8? I’d cut out the enormous display ads from the movie section. Some of you, approaching middle age like me? Remember? Page after page in the newspaper, filled with oversized movie ads? My walls were papered with well-lathered Steve Reeves flexing as “Hercules.” I was a hopeless romantic even then and I’d scissor out flyers for Rock Hudson and Doris Day movies.
Tickets were a quarter, rare in the 1950s as a gold doubloon. Sometimes you’d luck out and there’d be weekday matinees for a dime (for kids, who should have been in school). There were double bills, sometimes triple. Most of America was not that far removed from the horse. Westerns and the manly art of shooting your problems or at least punching them in the nose was acceptable social behavior.
Sigh. How society has slipped.
My daughter is 21 now. The other night, we watched the animated “Bolt” for the 257th time. We both — still — want a real dog, Just — Like —Bolt. I have a lifetime film library, rattling about in my lame excuse for a brain. Indy? She won’t watch anything, “ancient.” Which is pre-2014. That puts a crimp on it, but, we sit together, on our own sofas, in the dark, smiles on our faces. I offer films she wouldn’t dream of seeing. The other night was a double bill of “The Judge” and “The Edge,” two of the better films of the last many years. She loved them.
I’m happy to report, my daughter no longer sucks her thumb, but, she still gives me the enthusiastic and child-like thumbs up. Without fail, in the middle of a movie, she’ll ask, “Dad. Can you make me some popcorn?”
It’s one of the sweetest things anyone has ever asked me.
A half-century from now, when she’s approaching middle age (like me) — I wonder. What will the movies she watches be like? Filled with screeching dinosaurs and wistful sweethearts? Pies in the face and spacecraft chases? End of movie, will there be that sullen hero on a horse, staring toward a distant horizon, off to winter’s snow-capped mountains without a sweater?
My cinema wish?
I hope there’s that special someone in my daughter’s future who watches movies with her, who loves her so much to make her popcorn …
Santa Clarita’s John Boston is Earth’s most prolific satirist. Summer reading time, so visit his bookstore at johnbostonbooks.com. Get “Adam Henry.” You’ll like it…
