I Have A Very Particular Set of Skills

             Okay…one skill.

             Don’t you wish you had a superpower? My favorite superhero has always been Spider-Man for a number of reasons.  One of them was the webs and wall-crawling.  I mean, flying would be the coolest, but something about spider powers seems closer to reality, as if they could actually happen.  But we live in this world where we don’t get anything that cool.  If you want a special ability or skill you have to work and train and practice.  Getting bitten by a radioactive critter would be so much easier.

             I have above average memory and I am adept at organizing my thoughts.  It’s basically what you need to write, so there’s a lot of practice involved.  My eyes are shitty and I still need to lose weight, so there’s not much there to work with.

             But sometime in the last year, I stumbled upon my unique skill. 

             I have the uncanny ability to recall where, when, and with whom I have ever seen a movie. If you throw a movie at me that I’ve seen in the last 30 years, I can tell you where I saw it and who I sat next to.  If I didn’t see it in the theater, I know that, too.  There are few caveats.  So far, I’m at about 98% accuracy.  The names of the theaters have faded from memory (I blame this on recognizing my skill so late in life) but in my mind’s eye I can describe it to you; plus give you a few other movies I have seen there.

             I saw Gremlins while on a trip to Syracuse with my aunt and brother. I saw WarGames in Colorado with my uncle.  I saw Return of the Jedi with my parents and my brother in Fashion Square in Orlando, at an afternoon showing.

             I saw Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure twice in one day with my friend Eric.  I saw Ghostbusters with Sam.  I saw War of the Worlds with Jo and her family in Lincoln City, Oregon.  I saw The Black Hole, Herbie Goes Bananas and Smokey and the Bandit II at a drive-in in Orlando off OBT.

             The first movie I saw with my wife was Barton Fink.  We were just friends.  We hated it. We would later see Philadelphia, where I cried like a baby. The shittiest movie I ever saw in theaters was Inspector Gadget.  I saw it with my son Nick. His first movie was the re-release of Star Wars Ep 4.  He fell asleep in my lap.

             It is a skill which is of no use to anyone.  Not even me.  But it is very real.

             I tried to reason it out.  I know that smell is the closest sense to memory, and that sense is very strong in my skull.  I don’t even have to put the memory into context. If a smell takes me back somewhere, I’m there instantly.   I don’t know why trips to the movie theater make such a stamp.  I can assume seeing favorites like Star Wars or Back to the Future, or a movie you saw on a first date (Scrooged, 1988) would make an impression on anyone.  But why do I remember seeing They Live with my friend Eric so clearly?

             The last movie I saw before 9/11 was Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back with my friend Andy.

             I skipped classes in community college to see GoodFellas with my old friend Todd.

             Amy and I laughed our asses off when we saw the original Hangover.  It was also when I saw my first red band trailer. There was a guy three rows ahead that didn’t laugh.  He said ‘that’s hilarious’ over and over.

             Maybe I could have been a brilliant pianist.  A surgeon.  A world-renowned scholar.  But sadly, no. I do know that Teen Wolf was the first movie I saw on my own.

             Go ahead.  Test me.  Ask me in the comments section.  I swear I’ll have something for you.