Days Gone By

I found an email that I had sent to a friend a couple of years ago, and it brought back so many memories that I wanted to share it here...

Friday past I went to the Drive-In. Yup, the Drive-In. You say to yourself "But there are no more Drive-Ins, they went the way of the Dodo Bird years and years ago. I haven't even thought about a Drive-In since I

was in short pants." Well, I didn't wear short pants, and if you did, well, maybe you are older than I remember. But just two weeks ago the nostalgia of the Drive-In has been returned to us here in Cow-Town.

The Race City Speedway has an inflatable screen they set up down-wind of the paving company and water treatment plant and beside the racetrack. In a gravel parking lot ringed with porta-potties swarmed by all manner of bugs and flies, there are no painted lines in the parking lot to show you were to park. You tune your FM radio to 88.5, (gone are the window boxes of the old outdoor theatres) and settle in with some stale popcorn and warm pop from the concession.

The feature was? Wait for it... ET: Extra Terrestrial. The perfection, the symmetry that the Drive-In movie I saw was one that was probably premiered at a Drive-In theatre two and a half decades ago. Drew Barrymore in  her precocious youth... "To the space ship, to the moon!!" It was perfect. And to make it even more perfect, the sound cut out half way through the film for about 5 minutes and the night was alive with the sounds of honking horns to inform the underpaid staff that well, the sound had gone out.

It was a perfect reminder of how much we love the Drive-In...   unpredictable audio, a bug on your windshield right in front of the  screen, big trucks parked in front of you, windows fogging 10 minutes in, headlights turning on, for what seems like no reason, right behind you and blinding you through the mirrors, and light pollution from the city lights making the picture too dark to make out for about half of the movie. And afterward, two sets of cars getting boosts in the parking lot because their batteries are dead... ah the Friday night Drive-In, perfect with all its imperfections. I wouldn't have had it any other way. Except the littering of garbage left behind... scattered across the ground by socially unconscious teenagers. But I still say.... Hooray for the  Friday night Drive-In!! It made me feel simultaneously old and young... oh but what a great reminder of days gone by!!

Peace out

Dar