Today my wife and I did something that every parent has to do at least once: we took our daughter to her first movie. Granted, this was a movie that we both wanted to see, but using our little girl as an excuse to go see Toy Story 3 was about as good of a reason as any.
It just so happens, though, that the theater we went to see it in ranks up there as one of the most incompetent theaters I’ve ever been to. They got hit by lightning a few weeks ago (while we were there), and didn’t offer vouchers for the tickets. They just told us to come back with our stubs, and they’d remember it. So, when we got there today I was told my stubs weren’t good for 3D movies, and I’d need to talk to a manager. Fortunately, the manager was good on his word, and we got in to see the movie with time to spare. I won’t go into the lack of 3D glasses for children for a CHILDREN’S MOVIE, or the fact that this was a movie that could stand on its own just fine without some flavor of the month gimmick.
After standing in line for refreshments behind three girls getting large cokes and large popcorns for the latest vampire movie, I vowed to never again go to the movies when a vampire movie was playing.
After getting the popcorn to share and a coke for wife and me, I walked in to see my little girl patiently waiting for the movie to begin, watching some awful previews and wearing adult-sized 3D glasses. She eventually shed the glasses, and I’m wondering if she would have been better at a 2D showing. Again, though, there was no option for the 2D, but I digress...
Anyway, there’s something about being a parent that makes it incredibly difficult to watch movies like this. I don’t know if I’ve always been so quick to wear my emotions on my sleeves, but movies like this one and Up really, really have tugged at my heartstrings more than anything else I can remember.
Without being too spoilerific the opening sequence of this movie has got to hit every parent in the gut. I sit around watching my daughter bake birthday cakes every day in her kitchen for Baby Doll and her friends at school, the opening sequence of TS3 really brought home how real that imagination is for children, how vividly they can create these worlds in which they inhabit.
I learned tonight, though, that these are not necessarily worlds that we can inhabit. I sat down to try to help my daughter with her birthday cake, and she said to me, “Stop messing with my stuff, Daddy!” It appears to me that we can only be so blessed to peak into their worlds; we can only be invited into them at their will. Hopefully, though, this is an invitation that I’m always willing to accept.
