It’s been quite some time since I wrote any real personal shit up here. But tonight I just wanted to…I dunno…confront or acknowledge something?!? Not really sure what I’m trying to say here, so I’ll just start letting it come naturally. My apologies if this is all over the place as I have nothing planned…
I saw Spider-Man: Far From Home, like 5 times in the theater. That year was a tough one for me as my pup Bindi was nearing the end of her journey.
She was suffering from a plethora of issues such as dementia, and degenerative myelopathy…and the writing was on the wall. Her care the last several months of her long 16 year life involved diapers, sleepless nights, random whining and pacing, medication, a wheelchair, and a steady supply of my losing my patience and breaking down uncontrollably.
I found myself looking to escape for a few hours at night fairly often, and the movie theater was my where I found some peace. That year, I probably saw over 100 movies in the theatre. It was a place for me to kinda get a little lost. A sanctuary to house and temporarily heal a very fragile and emotional me. A place I was able to forget about the real shit that was eating away at me…even if only for a couple of hours.
That time period seems very foggy in my mind in some ways. I felt like I was just going through the motions as I carved my way through the thick fog of life’s heavy overflowing baggage. That Spider-Man film was one of a few that year that weirdly helped me get to the next day.
I can’t help but think of these feelings and emotions again as the brand new Spidey film releases in just a few days. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately to be honest. Not only because I’m a gigantic mega fan of the WebHead and I can barely contain my child like excitement, but because it was the last movie I saw together with my late brother Pat who we lost this past July.
I remember I picked him up at some shitty bar in Elizabeth, New Jersey where we chugged a drink together before heading in over to the Jersey Gardens Mall to see the film. It was his first and I believe it was my 4th or 5th viewing at that time. We didn’t hang much at that point, so it was pretty cool to go chill at the movies with my older brother and see something I was passionate about.
He ended up falling asleep about half way through and I gave him some playful shit about it after the movie was done. But something about that specific night has resonated with me since. He initiated and pushed for us to hang that night which was a rarity. At the time I didn’t realize how special a 4th (or 5th) viewing of a dumb movie was. Until now.
So as this new Spidey comes out, the memory of that simple evening out together with my brother just keeps replaying in my head. Most things around that timeframe for months on end are foggy, everything except for that night. That one memory is crystal clear and I don’t know if I should be grateful or saddened for that…
(Artist unknown)