The Bean Blog

What do a small alien phoning home, John Travolta in skimpy shorts and a big yellow bird have in common?

Apr 25, 2008 Misty watercolor memories

This week’s Friday Flashback theme is movies. Her Bad Mother tells us to write about our first or most memorable early movie memory.

I have a couple of early movie memories.

When I was eight-years-old, I remember standing in a really, really, really, really long line to go see E.T. Did I mention the line was long? That’s about all I remember about that experience. [Aren't I just a fabulous story teller?] I do know I loved the movie and we actually saw it in the theater more than once. I even had a little stuffed E.T. that I loved dearly. I also think this was the start of my girl crush on Drew Barrymore, who I still love to this day.

Oh and when my mom lived in California we went to Universal Studios and they had this E.T. exhibit with a bike and a green screen. They picked somebody out of the crowd to ride the bike and then we could see them flying on the green screen. I was so pissed I wasn’t picked to ride that bike.

In other news you couldn’t care less about, I just discovered E.T. was released on my birthday in 1982. Interesting.

Then when I was nine-years-old, my mom’s friend, Tree (which I believe was short for Theresa), took me to see Staying Alive.

This was memorable because we brought out own food. But not just a little food. We brought a lot of food. We brought our own popcorn in big brown paper bag, some candy, maybe even some grapes and our own cans of sodas. And somehow we snuck it all in to the theater. I remember we had to be quiet when we opened our cans of soda so they didn’t make too much noise when the top popped. That Tree was a crazy one.

About thirteen-years-ago, I went to a party at co-workers house. It was a bunch of us girls (and one guy) and we had a John Travolta night. We watched a bunch of Travolta movies, including Staying Alive (and Saturday Night Fever and Urban Cowboy). Good times.

Then when I was 11, we went to see Follow That Bird, a Big Bird movie. I was way to old and mature to be at a Big Bird movie, but we brought my Aunt Candy’s, friend’s son (wow, that was a mouthful). I can’t remember the boys name, but his mom, Laura, was (and I think still is) one of my aunt’s very good friends.

This movie was memorable because of what happened in the theater. It was this big theater somewhere near Daly City, California. Like many theaters the floor slants up. But in this theater the seats didn’t start until halfway up the floor. In other words, there was a huge gap between the screen and the first row of seats. There were no seats to crimp your neck. We sat in the front row. Some time in the middle of the movie I accidentally kicked my soda. It fell over and spilled all over the floor. I spent the rest of the movie watching my soda slowing roll down the cement floor towards the screen. I was so bummed.

Read about others (more exciting) memorable movie memories:
Assertagirl
Frances
IrishKat
Izzy Mom
Oh The Joys
Mamalogues
Mrs. Flinger
Parenting Toys
Posts From the Playground
Sweetney

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Tags: E.T., Follow That Bird, Friday Flashback, movie memories, Staying Alive