Why I Love the Dog Days

It's hot tonight.  The family, including the dog, have all retreated to the cool downstairs to sleep.  But I'm stubborn. And I like my bed. So I stay upstairs. With the windows closed, for fear of Coyotes, Cougars and Bears (oh my!) 

Obviously, no humans can sleep in this heat.  So this human's mind starts to wander.

I'm thinking back to that movie, Dog Day Afternoon.  Did you see that?  Starred Al Pacino - a much more youthful Al Pacino, but already chewing up the scenery.  And (I'm no film expert but...) seemed to have one of the earliest portrayals of a transgendered character in a mainstream movie. Lots of swearing too, as I recall.



A bit fuzzy though, because I was 12 years old when I saw it. My 16-year old sister and I ventured across town to the Denman Place movie theatre to see it.  Definitely not on our home territory.  Not sure what possessed us to go over there, or how our parents allowed it.  My theory is they were just tired and worn out by that point, and maybe couldn't remember, on any given day, how many of the 6 of us even lived at home any more.

So we found our way to the exotic and (at that time) slightly sketchy West End, had to talk our way into the movie (I was vastly underage for the movie's classification), grabbed some popcorn and sat down. No need to worry about cellphones and texting interrupting our experience - those things DID NOT EXIST YET.

As I recall, we enjoyed every second of the movie.  The heat, the sweat, the swearing (*#!%!!), the over-acting...

When we emerged late at night, we found the streets covered in snow.  In Vancouver, 'covered' means about an inch of snow.  Prairie equivalent would be about a foot. Enough to bring our city to a halt.

But we didn't really know that the city was at a halt.  We were kids. So we trudged the 2 or so kilometers over to the bus stop for our direct bus home, confident that we'd hop on and it would whisk us away to our house on the hill.  We got there with damp shoes but in high spirits, practicing all the movie swear words (*#!%!!) while we walked. 

And then we waited.  And waited.  And waited some more.  It was still snowing, so the one inch soon became two inches. We amused ourselves by watching the cars sliding down and spinning up Burrard Street.  Unaware of the significance of this... We were kids. And so we waited some more. 
 
Eventually, we figured it out.  No bus was coming.  We were 12 and 16 years old, downtown, at midnight, no money for a cab, and not even sure how to take a cab if we could have found one . Hmmm. Time to phone the parents.  At midnight.  In the snow. From the Hyatt hotel, whose staff seemed intent on keeping us damp, scraggly kids out of their pristine space. I think I finally teared up and snuffled, so they relented and let us in.

Pretty sure we woke the parents up when we called.  I prefer not to think about why they weren't still wide awake, worried sick about the fact that their 12 and 16 year old girls had not yet returned home from the wilds of the big city.  But, like I said - there were 6 of us kids, they were tired and worn out. They'd lost count.

Dad said he'd come get us.  Although the hotel had let us in the door to use our dime in their payphones, they saw no reason why they should have us hanging around inside the lobby disturbing their paying guests.  So back we went outside, to the bus stop to wait for Dad.

It took a long time.  Remember, Vancouver comes to a halt in one inch of snow.  And now there were 2+ inches.  But eventually he made it.  That brown & beige Chevy Concours (an ugly, ugly car) never looked so beautiful as when it turned the corner from Georgia and slid up in front of us.

Being in the car reminded me of the movie we'd just seen - a blast of heat, a bit of sweat, definitely some swearing (*#!%!!) - from Dad - and lots of over-acting - from us - about the trials and tribulations we'd suffered in the last few hours. But it was really cosy.  A warm and safe embrace.

Maybe it's why I like to stick it out upstairs, even in the doggiest dog days of the summer.  It's a warm and safe embrace - especially with the windows shut tight against the wild, wild world.