Grandma takes one for the team.

As many of you already know (because I write about it often), I loooove going to the movies.  Love love love. 

The movie theatre is one of my very favourite “happy places”.  I adore the experience of taking in a movie on the big screen, in a darkened theatre, in a big comfy seat, with a bag of buttery popcorn in my hands.

How exactly I came to love movie theatres as much as I do, though, is a bit of a mystery.

The only time I ever remember my dad going to a movie was the very first movie I saw in theatres.  I was really young, so it’s an extremely vague memory, but he & my mom took us to see Honey I Shrunk The Kids.  Seriously.  That’s the only recollection I have of my dad ever going to the movies. 

And my mom?  Well, she definitely got the job of taking me to the movies more often, but it wasn’t one of her favourite things to do.  Usually it involved begging and a little bit of crying to get her there.  Oh, and the promise of Bruce Willis always seemed to help.  (That would explain the fact that I managed to get her out to Armageddon, The Whole Nine Yards, AND The Sixth Sense.)  I can probably count on one hand the number of times my mom took me to the movies when I was a kid, though.

Mom was always quite happy to let Luke & I join my cousin Patti & her boys when they were going to the movies, and it was probably on those trips when I was a kid that made me truly fall in love with the movie theatre experience.

But I definitely didn’t get it from my mother.

I had been promising my niece and nephew all summer long that I was going to take them on a date to the movies.  It’s one of my favourite things to do with them, as I hope to instill in them the same love of “going to the movies”. 

Unfortunately, busy summer weekends kept getting in the way, and I was starting to worry my promise would never be fulfilled.  I finally arranged to take them on Sunday afternoon, and I had been looking forward to it all week long.  I looked up movie times last Friday, and thought we’d probably take in the movie Planes at the theatre in Hull at 2:30.

However, when I decided to double-check the movie times early yesterday afternoon, I discovered I’d somehow made a mistake.  Planes was only showing in French at my go-to theatre, and there were no other movies suitable for children playing in English there at all.  There were options at other theatres, but we were already too late to get to them, or they were going to be too late in the day.

There was one.  And only one.  And that was The Smurfs 2 in 3D at the Colisseum in Ottawa at 2:50 PM.

And Danica informed me immediately that she would NOT go because she would NOT wear the 3D glasses.

I had a real ol’ flipping meltdown.  I told her she wasn’t being very nice.  And I might have actually slumped down in my chair and cried.  (To which my mother admonished, “Oh, c’mon, you’re worse than a kid!!!”)  Caden and I pleaded with Danica to please just try them out, that it would be fun, but she just kept shaking her head “no”.

The reason for my meltdown was two-fold, I believe.  The first part was because I felt like a crappy aunt.  I’m always very careful about checking movie times, and I couldn’t believe I’d somehow screwed it up.  I knew Caden especially was really looking forward to it, and I hated the thought of letting him down because of my own stupidity.

The other part?  Well, that was purely selfish.  But I was mad because I really really love going to the movies, and I’d really really been looking forward to going and getting my popcorn and having fun with the kids.  And I was disappointed that it might not happen now.

Grandma tried to figure out an alternative.  She suggested renting a movie at the store and watching it at her house.  Caden and I both said it wouldn’t be the same.  She then scanned the movie times and was looking up maps to find out where the movie theatre was in Barrhaven, because The Smurfs was playing there, not  in 3D, but I informed her I wouldn’t have time to get all the way out there for the 2:30 showing, and I didn’t even know where the hell Barrhaven was.  Caden and I asked Dan if she’d stay with Grandma while we went on without her, and she just kept shaking her head with that scowl on her face.  The more we begged, the more adamant she became.  She was NOT going to wear those damned 3D glasses, and Caden and I weren’t going to either!!

It was a disaster.  A real ol’ frigging disaster.

Finally, Mom said, “Danica, will you wear the glasses if Grandma comes and wears them too?”

She nodded her head instantly.

Grandma to the rescue!!!

Mom really didn’t want to go.  She muttered something about how the last thing she thought she’d be doing on a Sunday afternoon was going to see The damn Smurfs and wearing silly 3D glasses, but if it was going to keep the peace between me and here darling grandchildren…  she would do it.

We had fun.  The movie was cute, the kids seemed to enjoy it, and lo and behold, Danica didn’t seem to mind wearing those glasses at all as long as Grandma was sitting beside her wearing them too.

Now if only I’d thought to take a picture to commemorate the occasion… ;)

Thank you, Grandma, for taking one for the team yesterday!!  You saved the day for me, and I owe you one now for sure!!!