My Lloyd

Say Anything was named the most romantic movie since 1975 by Entertainment Weekly. Even the Washington Post has commented on the popular obsession with this movie. But I've never been enamored of this movie--probably because before I ever saw Say Anything, I dated my own Lloyd Dobler.

Like Diane I was an over-achieving high school senior and like most seniors, she and I both looked ahead and saw an uncertain future as we made the transition from high school to college. Having someone’s unconditional love as reassurance during that transition time encouraged us both to leave home and challenge ourselves.

I met D when he was still spending summers working at the movie theater, even though he was a high school teacher nearly 10 years my senior. He had aged out of his trench coat phase before I met him and at first he was just someone to safely flirt with as I broke out of my shy mold. After I replaced him as the object of my affections, he began to subtly pursue me.

We started seeing each other at Easter and our relationship became public in June after I graduated. After our summer together, I went away to school and our connection continued through expensive hours on the phone, visits and special packages that arrived for me. Sometimes they were just letters—sent with humorous return addresses to make me smile before I even opened the envelope. Once he sent flowers, but more often they were mix tapes complete with detailed explanations of why he included each song. Included on the first tape was “In Your Eyes” by Peter Gabriel from the romantic climax of Say Anything.

During our second summer together D continued his mission to show me classic 80s teen flicks, but despite talking about it, somehow we never saw Say Anything together. That August I broke up with him as we sat in his car—paralleling another pivotal Say Anything scene.

Once, months after we broke up, he told me that he’d already planned when he was going to propose to me and when we were going to get married. No boomboxes outside my window or taped letters would be able to bring me back to him because by that point I’d already moved on from my Lloyd.

Unlike the women quoted in the Washington Post article, I’m not still looking for Lloyd—now I’m hoping for Jake Ryan.

Power nap

Over the holiday season while I worked at the movie theater, we hired a college student to supplement our staff. One slow afternoon he asked me to wake him at the end of his half-hour break because he was going to take a power nap. A little over 30 minutes later, I sent one of our floor staff in to wake him. She came out of the break room and reported that he wasn’t in there. I thought maybe I’d misunderstood him and sent her to check the back rows of the movie theaters. No luck so the only place left to check was the projection booth. When she reported that he wasn’t up there either, I felt guilty and a little panicked. I walked into the break room to begin retracing our steps and noticed a pair of shoes sticking out from under the table, like the wicked witch’s shoes from under Dorothy’s house. I felt immediate relief and leaned under the table to wake him up. Apparently his power nap included the power to be a little invisible.

A good manager

This trip down memory lane sponsored by: The Rudeness of Strangers, Vol. 1 posted at TWM.

An irate patron came out of one of our movie theaters on a busy Saturday night and stomped up to the manager Jon.
Jon: Can I help you sir?
Patron: Yes, the man in front of me keeps standing up. I ask him to sit down, he sits down, and then he stands back up again!
Jon: I'm sorry about that sir--here are some free passes so you can come back and enjoy the movie some other time.

Then another man approaches Jon.
Patron 2: I'm the guy that was sitting in front of him. (Pointing at man angrily retreating back to his movie.)
Jon: Why don't you tell me what happened, sir?
Patron 2: Every time I sit down, he kicks me in the head! I stand up, turn around and ask him to stop kicking me. Then I sit down and he kicks me again!

Patron 2 also got free passes, along with our sincere apologies. We waiting until they were both gone before we started to laugh hysterically!

Tonight

I first discovered I could flirt when I was working at a movie theater as a senior in high school. My future boyfriend D told me that he "had my number" and I turned to look at him and said, "No, but you could have it."

Lately I've been putting this long neglected skill to use with two guys in my office.

First there was a surveyor who is at least seven years older than I am. He's a bit of a flirt and while I began to enjoy the extra attention, I quickly knew that I didn't want it to go beyond that.

Since then, we've hired a new engineer straight from college. At first I mistook his earnestness for arrogance. But through my efforts to reach out to our other young engineers, information dissemination became friendly conversation. I see things in him that may not appear in my ideal boyfriend template, but I look forward to his visits, I enjoy giving him a hard time and he makes me laugh.

Oh, and we have a (maybe) date tonight. Cross your fingers for me--I'm a little out of practice!

No mistletoe required

Butterflies swirled around my stomach as I climbed the steep, dark stairs up to the projection room. Ants was a flirt with everyone, but the flirting had intensified between us in the weeks preceding this Christmas Eve shift at the theater and I knew that something was going to happen when I got upstairs to share my break with him.

Every girl's first kiss is permanently etched in her memory and mine is the same. I can't describe how the moment came about, but I can't forget how he tasted (like vanilla candy canes), how he smelled and how his lips felt pressed against mine.

I hugged the moment close to me all afternoon. When my mom arrived to take me directly to my grandmother's for oyster stew, I slipped down to the theaters to get a surreptitious kiss goodbye before floating out the doors behind her.