Thoughts after watching an old movie

When I was a child there were very few Saturday afternoons that I didn't go to the old Star Theater to watch a movie. I very seldom went to the Arbo, but sometimes also went there. With the money left over from the ticket and the snack I shared in the theater I tried to have enough to go buy an ice cream cone across the street. I thought our parents were being generous but I realize now that it was a harmless way to have your child occupied while you shopped or visited on the Square. (Todays's parents will find that hard to believe -- that it was a harmless way to spend an afternoon.)

During the school year when we were in Washington, D.C., my friends, always my sister Ellen and her friend, Pauline, would take the bus and streetcar downtown to F Street to get in to see a movie at matinee prices if we were there before 11 a.m. Then we would go to People's Drug Store and eat a tuna fish sandwich and a milkshake and then come home. It would not be uncommon for some of us, at least Ellen and me, and maybe our sister Gertrude to walk over to the Avalon Theater on Connecticut Avenue that night to see another movie, usually one that had been on F Street several weeks before.

Every Monday night my parents had a movie date to go downtown to see a first run movie. For this occasion they drove the family car and parked it across from the Whte House by the park and then walked maybe to the Earl Theater across from the Treasury Department. An advantage of being the youngest children left at home was that sometimes Papa would ask Ellen and me if we had any homework (we never managed to have any) and invite us to go with them.

In fact we were in a theater on F Street the night Pearl Harbor was bombed and as we left the theater newsboys were running around yelling "Japan Attack U.S." or "U.S. at War." Papa wouldn't buy a paper but went upstairs to his office in the Press Building to make a call to verify the news. I can vividly remember standing by the window in his office looking down at the excitement below on the streets. I was worried about my three brothers and classmates. I don't remember walking back to the car afterward. Perhaps that night Papa had parked nearer his office.

Back to the present, I have had several days where I felt that the best thing for me to do was stay in the lounge chair and either read, play Scrabble on my smart phone, or watch TV. I found Tyrone Power starring in a seafaring movie. I don't know how many readers can remember Tyrone Power, the swatchbuckling dueling good looking romantic appeal in the old adventure films. I thought I would watch for a while to renew my memories, but got caught up in the story and watched till the romantic end, sitting on the nearest to the edge of my seat as the lounge chair would allow.

I knew how it would come out. I had a dim memory of having seen the exact picture before, but I didn't even want to take a potty break to miss any of the action. I knew the producers wouldn't let Tyrone Power fail. I knew it would come out all right, but how it happened, and watching how the sailing warships of the time navigated on the whipped backs of the imprisoned laborers under the deck with their oars was enlightening. The lavishness of the captain's quarters, the superb supporting cast, made the long afternoon pass in a few minutes while I relived scenes from my childhood movies.

In these times where all we hear are accusing threats against the "other" party, the "other" enemies, it was refreshing to become lost in a world long past where things did turn out OK. A world where the bad men show their evilness right away, and where good does triumph. The courtesy that the star gave to his crew, and to the crew of the captured ship, the deference paid to ladies, and the loyalty to his own Queen, although perhaps unrealistic, was comforting. I longed to have Ellen beside me to explain some of the historic facts, but also to have her hush me up if I asked too many questions. I wanted to have someone who had shared the movie with me to discuss it as we walked home or to the car.

I was glad to spend an afternoon out of my chair, with my loved ones and friends to relive the adventures of a charming adventurer

Somehow it wasn't quite the same when Lester came home and asked, "What's that stuff you are watching?" I had to remember that his childhood had not been immersed in a darkened theater.