Summer drive-ins

This weekend was the last before school gets seriously underway. Officially, my kids started back to school last Wednesday. But those first three days are never anything serious, and Labor Day weekend is when people really consider summer vacation to be officially over. It’s the last hoorah, as it were. This year though, the kids are with their mom for Labor Day. So for us together, this past weekend was it for summer break.

Since my divorce a couple years ago, the kids and I have a standing Friday night tradition over the summers. Every Friday together we head to the drive-in movies, unless there isn’t anything family-appropriate to take them to. Most people when they hear that we’re heading to the drive-in either ask “Where is there a drive-in around here?” or “What the heck is a drive-in movie?” For the unintiated, a drive-in movie is exactly what it sounds like. You load up your car with you and the kids, drive up to the ticket window, pay only for those in the car older than 11, and watch movies on a big screen in the great outdoors. Drive-ins have no fancy sound system (you listen on your car radio or a boombox), no stadium seating, and the restrooms and concession areas look like they were last renovated somewhere around the time I was born.

In short, they’re fantastic.

Seriously, going to the drive-in is a much more family experience. Things feel more personal and connected somehow. You may read my blog, but are we really connected? Nah. I’m too chicken to put my personal info out there to be phished. So unless you start leaving me comments and I get to know you better, you’ll know lots about my life but never know me. At the drive-in you wind up having conversations with strangers that offer to share popcorn and blankets if it gets too chilly by the time the second show starts (yes, drive-ins give you two movies back-to-back). Your kids run out into the open area in front of the screen to play with other kids that they don’t know, and have a blast doing it. Up until last year, one of the drive-ins we frequent even had a swing set.

Yes, I said “one of the drive-ins”. There are three that we haunt depending on what’s playing where.

If you’ve read my sister’s blog at “Looking for George” you may be already familiar with the fact that we grew up in a town coloquially referred to as “Cooterville”. It can be a bit hick (like San Francisco can be a bit liberal), but that also means that time has stood still in some respects for our hometown. I’m a well-educated, technolgically progressive guy, but it’s nice to be able to step back in time. So having a hometown that lets me do that can be nice. Part of that is having two drive-in theatres within five minutes of my parents’ house, and another within thirty minutes. And the one within thirty minutes has two screens showing different movies. So technically we have a choice of four places to watch movies on Fridays. The state in which we live actually has the largest number of operating drive-in theatres left in the country. And I hope that never changes.

So this past weekend the movie selection was a little thin. One of the theates had already closed for the season. Two of the other three screens were showing the same movies or movies we had already seen a couple times (Harry Potter is one that just continues to make money it seems). And there was no way I was taking the kids to see “Superbad”. I won’t even take me to see it. So the question I posed to the kids was “Do we want to go see these two movies at the drive-in, or just stay home and do something else instead?” There was no question as far as the kids were concerned: the drive-in had to be done, especially since it was their last chance for the year.

I’m really glad the my kids and I have something special like that. Something that we know is “our thing” to do as a family. Now I just have to find something we can do during the school months as “our thing” while the drive-in is closed. Summer, you weren’t long enough this year.