NIGHT AT THE MOVIES

I finally had the courage to call Kathy a cute sophomore I met in the cafeteria line.  I got her phone number from a mutual friend.  Her father answered and sounded stern.  He reluctantly said that K could come to the phone – “But be brief, she must get back to her homework!”  Yikes!!

After some inane chat, to my surprise she said she might go to the movies with me on Friday night - but she would have to ask her parents first before she could accept my invitation.  She also let me know that her dad not favor her driving in cars with older high school boys.  I was a bit taken back but hoped I would be accepted by her parents.  (Later after we were “going steady” I learned that her father, a former teacher who had actual taught my mother, called one of my teachers for a recommendation – she told him I was an honorable guy, on the honor roll and had earned two varsity letter which I think did the trick.)

I borrowed my grandfather’s 1954 Chevy coupe because unlike my dad’s car it had a radio and it was an automatic – I really wasn’t all that good shifting my dad’s stripped down ford with its slipping transmission.  At K’s house I called at her door rather than just blowing the horn – this was a wise mandate suggested by my mother.  

K’s dad invited me in and scanned me from head to foot and back again – he was scary. 

“How do you think our basketball teams going to do this season?” He tried to make conversation as I waited for his only daughter.  My answer, "Good."
I wondered if I were he would I let my daughter go out with me? Hum.

I worried I put on too much Old Spice and feared maybe he was thinking me a wise guy or high school “gigolo”.  K's dad was a business manager and they lived in a big brick house far from the other side of the tracks – where I literally came from.  I was dating indeed far above my station.

I had eight dollars, my entire life savings, in my wallet.  Plenty for tickets to the show, popcorn to share and a nightcap ice cream sodas at the Goodie Shop down the street.

The Levoy Theatre was one of two movie houses in our town.  It was the fancy one, built when movies were the kings of entertainment, long before television bumped them down a notch or two.  From vaudeville to Dish Night to 3D in colorama – it had been a fixture in town for years.  After a stop at the enclosed ticket booth five large double doors led to a an ornate foyer where an ancient gentleman, who started as a boy usher there, now was the guarding ticket taker.  He stood by a small tower device, took and tore one’s ticket in half give you the half and deposited the other into a tower - a depository of many winning contest numbers over the years.  

Inside another set of large doors was a very well  stocked refreshment counter which took up half of the back of the theater.  It was ruled over by the wife of Mr. Ticket.  She too had been there since Fay Ray was a youngster.  The smell of freshly popped corn with extra butter was impossible to resist.  

There were three aisles that led to the gilded   stage, complete with deep burgundy velvet curtains hiding the screen and an orchestra pit,  now usually empty since the “talkies” came to Millville. Above us was the sensuous dark balcony – the passion pit for folks who didn't come to watch movies. I would not think of guiding K up the stairs tonight - first date protocol made it off-limits for at least two more dates.    

As we walked down the center aisle high above  was an artwork of a bygone age - a large plaster medallion bas relief on the ceiling in front of the stage.  It looked like a giant white coin and depicted three half naked, nymphs dancing forever to Pan's tune.  I think it was there to give our emporium of cowboy ambushes and car chases an arty atmosphere.  On each side wall were two giant fabric maps in faded blue and gray - the American continent on one and Europe and Asia on the other.  Another attempt to add international "culture" to our small town movie going.

Friday nights were scheduled to appeal to the high school trade. It was not a night for film noir.  It was dedicated to slapstick and romance.  We chose seats  half way down in the middle.   K indicate that sitting too close “made her dizzy.”

The lights dimmed as K dug into "our" popcorn.  I was determined to hold back the Hershey’s chocolate to at least the start of the feature.  The creaking curtains parted as the audience hooted to see a Pop Eye cartoon light the silver screen.  Next a newsreel with the loud narrator was greeted with a few groans.  A couple of coming attractions led to the Feature Presentation and it is indelibly burned into my memory.  

Rome Adventure, a  romantic film that introduced  Suzanne Pleshette to the film world.  A perfect first date movie.  
And as it progressed to Troy Donahue’s kissing with a young school teacher on vacation – my teenage libido stirred deep within my corpuscles and I felt the  the need to begin the age old dance of love.  

The question?  Try to hold hands?  I started to feel warm and hoped my roll-on, guaranteed to not offend, stick deodorant would do its job.   I stop thinking about the movie and started to watch the big clock over the exit door and made a silent vow – in ten minutes I would make Thee Move.

Time ticked at a snail's pace but the appointed moment final came and I nonchalantly place my hand next to K’s on the armrest.  Our pinkies touch but simultaneously she thrust her hand it into the popcorn box.  Foiled at my first sortie, I decided to try the arm on the back of her seat stretch move.  A classic for a first date.  If she didn’t recoil this would mean I had a green light to go to the next step - my arm would move from seat back to her shoulder and then…who knows where this could lead - true love perhaps.   

Small beads of sweat started to appear on my upper lip.  It was now or never.  I carefully moved my arm to the back of her seat.  K immediately shot a surprised glare that froze me, removed my arm and handed it to me saying, “Please don’t…It's far too soon,” - the dreaded response.

The movie ended and we made our exit.  K said she need to go straight home so skipped the ice cream parlor.  We didn't say too much driving her home.

When we pulled into K’s driveway she politely thanked me for “a very nice time” and quickly made an exit.  Our date was concluded.

As I drove home I regretted being "fast" as she must have thought of me.    I guessed that I wouldn’t be seeing her again.  
Little did I know at that moment K was chatting on the phone with her best girlfriend – with a big smile.

I had no idea that she had skillfully set the hook and soon would be reeling me in – and that a new life adventure was about to begin.

THE FIRST AND THE LAST

The first senior week of school is finally over.  After a summer of loafing it seemed like much longer than only three days after Labor Day 1961.  And my legs kill.  Up and the down staircase five or six times a day and then hours of football practice.

But Friday's was always a "light day" (usually unless we lost the week before!) - no pads and we just run every offense and defensive play in the book.  But we got to go home early (unless we lost the week before !!)

Sore muscles or not tonight Bub and I were going out.

He picked me up in the yellow bomb - our loving name for his 1949 Buick that his father gave him after he got the blue bomb, a 1958 buick - he was a "Buick Man" as the afficianodo of that brand was known.  They were a sect set far above the Chevy owner and the Plymouth owner was not even allowed in their league of drivers.

We "tooled the Great White Way" which was our name for Millville's one and only main drag - High Street.  I still wonder just what it was above to be called high.  After several tours of the familiar circuit Bub said, "No babes! Chip in 50 cents for gas and we can go to Ocean City."

"And more important - and back," I added.

We set the old Buick land speed record - doing at least 47 MPH all the way on the empty road as the poor old thing wheezed and sputtered on our dollar's worth of petrol.

Ocean City was closed.

The most depressing thing about a boardwalk is the weekend after Labor Day.  "CLOSED FOR THE SEASON...WE APPRECIATE YOUR BUSINESS...SEE YOU IN THE SPRING...THANKS FOR A GREAT YEAR"
The signs read on most of the shops along the boards.  And there was a chilly wind off the water.  Not at all like the many warm nights we spent "walking the boards" and on the prowl for babes.

There was evidence of the end of summer everywhere.  The ponies on the big merry-go-round where covered with canvas.  There were no cars on the tracks of the loop-da-loop.

This was more depressing than High Street was.

Bob's Grill at the end of our long stroll was open - of course the many sexy waitress were not there.  An ancient old dude made two milk shakes for us in an empty place that would have been overflowing just days before.

But all good things must eventually come to an end.  Our summer vacations would be no more as we would both work those once days off for the next four years of college.  Ocean City had changed.

And appropriately as we walked back to the car a light rain started to fall which made it more depressing.  We drove the 26 miles to home without saying much. Bub and I would never go looking for chicks again.  Summer jobs, college life and new girlfriends changed everything.

And an Ocean City adventure on the boards would never come again.