I love going to the movies. I love sitting in the back row of the theater, the screen in front looming large and all enveloping. I love as the electronic base notes of some unnamed instrument come through the speakers and the lights dim- all announcing...here it is, transport to another world in 3...2...1.
I'm lucky enough to have an older 8 movie cinema in a town around 35 minutes away. The seats don't recline, and (thankfully)I don't have to pick an assigned one, but there is stereo surround and a cupholder. When Covid hit last year and they closed down, I was afraid they might not ever reopen. (I really don't know what I would do if they closed for good. I hyperventilate just thinking about it!) When they did reopen, for weekends with limited capacity showing reruns of old movies at $5.00, I think I was the first one through the door. I handed over $100.00 from my stimulus check and asked for a gift card. I don't know who was more excited about it, the owner or me!( I think I believed that I was single-handedly insuring their continued success with that gift card. After all, at only $5.00 a movie, that required them to stay open for at least 20 weeks!) Last summer I even convinced him to show Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I don't know how he managed it, but the next weekend a life size cut out of Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka in the concession area greeted me upon my arrival. That was a picture moment.
There truly is something magic about being at the movies. My husband prefers to only see certain
movies on the big screen (Star Wars, Historical war dramas), the ones that would be stunted on our 32 inch. He'd rather give Amazon $4.99 for HD and watch the rest from the comfort of his chair. Not me though. I want the experience.
And so I go to the movies by myself almost every Saturday. I hit the first showing when the theater is still mainly empty, and most of the time it's just me. Me. All alone in the theater with my popcorn and fountain soda. And then for two hours, I'm somewhere else. I'm lost on another world (real or imagined) following romances and heartache, decisions and denial. Whatever is on my mind (and there is always something on my mind) takes a respite, and I find myself laughing and crying along with the characters, who for those precious minutes, have allowed me to live beyond myself. I'm thankful for that.
PS. I may or may not bring in my own soda fountain balanced precariously in my purse (half diet coke, half cherry coke, crushed ice, metal straw...there is nothing better.) but I do buy the popcorn!