Spider Prophet

There is a sub-culture in New York. Yes, making that statement is pointing at the obvious, but I just recently had an encounter with this particular group: Free Movie Goers.

Working a 9-5 schedule, and at two offices in midtown, I find myself around Lincoln Center frequently. As I walk to Barnes and Noble, the streets are filled with people heading home from work, going for a stroll with the baby, or doing some early-evening shopping. Prime time for Green Peace, HRC, and jug carrying UHO volunteers to hit the streets. However, among the money collectors and outreach workers, there are also people yelling into the crowd: “Free Screening of “American Gangster” this Wednesday!” They are, what I will call, the Movie Leafleteers.

Spotted along the block wherever a movie theater is present, these young men and women withstand the chilly, and soon to be wintery, weather and give out passes for free advance screenings around New York City (usually at the theater that they’re standing in front of, but occasionally at specific locations). Passersby are drawn to Movie Leafleteers for their non-uniformed and broke appearance. They stand there hanging out passes, trying to get as many people as possible during this high-traffic period of the day. Now, one screening may be for your feedback, others just to provide a full audience for a press viewing. But either way, you get a free movie, weeks/months in advance that you won’t get in trouble with the FBI for watching.

I picked one up on Sunday for today. I called the number on the flyer to reserve my place and just showed up at the theater address. I happened to get out of work early that day, so I showed up 30 minutes before lines were scheduled to start. I figured that there was some time to be wasted, and that perhaps I would read one of the comics I had supplied for myself. I quickly realized this was not the case when I was greeted by a line that was about 40 people deep. This is not shocking, however, considering that seats are not guaranteed though you may have RSVPed for the screening. I took my place in line and pulled out a copy of Fables to read as I planned my hour-and-a-quarter wait before the scheduled showtime.

Slowly, more and more people showed up and the left side of the theater’s lobby was congested with us. As I looked up from my reading, I watched people talking to each other, not really paying attention to what was being said. That is, until I heard the penetrating voice of the woman behind me: “I always say I’m 49.”

I try not to look up and show that I’m paying attention to the conversation, but she’s got me hooked, and I think she knows it.

“That’s the age range they’re looking for. Eighteen to forty-nine. I can’t pass for thirty anymore, but I can say I’m forty-nine,” she says, winking at the man standing with her. She goes on to talk about how she heard about this particular screening, through her e-mail. “I know everyone who does this” she says. “But they’re not here today.” Nobody bothers to point out the problem with her statement. “What kind of a pass do you have?” the woman asks, pointing at my folded sheet of lavender paper.

“Oh–It’s a pass that I picked up on 66th,” I quickly respond, unfolding and showing this imposing woman the paper. Though I’ve been deemed a social butterfly for years now, my roots are firmly based in social awkwardness. Inside, I’m quivering to the core and I’m sure that she must know.

“Oh, this is the one that kicks you out if you’re black or too old” she said, remarking to the screening company’s name. “I was at a screening with a friend a few weeks ago and they started to pull people out. All they’re concerned about is having the right demographics. They let me stay in the line, though.” She made no comment on whether her friend ended up seeing the movie or not, and again, no one questioned her.

“What movie was that?” asked a younger woman from further back in the line.

“You know, I don’t remember. It may have been Big Mama” the older woman responds as she pulls out a pair of glasses, that clearly hint at her actual age, and slips them on. “Yes, I think so. I saw Rendition the week after that.”

“Oh, I saw that this weekend,” I say without thinking.

“Did you pay for it?” she asks quickly. I can hear the “tsk-tsk” at the end of the question.

“Yeah. I went with a friend who came to visit me.”

“Oh, I never pay for movies anymore. Either I make a showing or I don’t go at all” says the woman in front of me in line. She has three kids with her. I smile weakly realizing that I’ve made a mistake by admitting to paying for movies. But how can paying for movies be so bad? I think to myself. Isn’t that how most people see them? I mean, they can’t gross millions unless people are buying tickets.

I take the lull in my sentencing to look around the crowd, and that’s when it hits me. Everyone is talking to one another. Though they all showed up separately, and didn’t really pay each other any attention in the beginning, everyone who was present was now chatting up a storm. This side of the lobby suddenly fell victim to a tumult of chatter. They know each other. Suddenly, I feel even more singled out than I did arriving alone. Here I was thinking that I’d arrived a carefree individual in the mood for a free movie. Little did I know that I was infiltrating a secret society with magnitudes similar to that of going stag to your high school prom.

- Spider

I’ve been working in Office for three weeks now. So far, it seems that my days are spent sitting at a computer desk, shredding papers, sorting other people’s mail and trying to shine and keep low at the same time. I’m still waiting to see if this is all that the days wil add up to. I’m banking that it won’t, and so here is this record of it.

Perhaps this is not the most gripping beginning to a tale, but one that the reader will have to accept. No, this does not begin like some sort of biographical film of a life. A close up of the writer sitting in a dark room in his post-college-hole-of-an-apartment, typing away madly at the story he both promises and denies will be the best story ever written (All depends who’s listening). No, this is the beginning (in medias res) of a planner. This story begins in semi-bright florescent light.

- Spider

I suppose that my largest concern right now is that I do not want my writing to simply become a diarrhea of any thought that comes into my mind. I want it that all the effort I am about to put into the career (which I continuously reaffirm as my goal) produces some writing of actual substance. Alright, perhaps not simply some, but a whole lot of it. Unfortunately, despite how much it is that I may desire, I cannot be certain of what it is that I am about to embark upon. Perhaps that should be the thrilling part about this journey; or, simply the most frightening aspect of it all; or, maybe they’re really just the same thing (as cliche as that overly simplified comment may be).

In the years before college (as it is the event in my life that for now everything exists in relation to) I spent almost all of my time reading novels and carrying a notebook in which I could write. Described as an avid reader at one point, but never really being able to describe myself as such (for f-ck’s sake, I don’t even think I knew what the word meant then), all I knew was that I enjoyed playing with words and the power that I believed they possessed.

 At times when I try to create a narrative of myself as a reader and storyteller, I find that I can trace it all the way back to when I was about four. I had seen the “Wizard of Oz” and wrote a illustrated story based around a tornado coming to town. I don’t remember much of it anymore, only that there was a lot of black circular movement from drawing that tornado.

The stories and writing provided a means of escape, and as Titania so aptly states in “Books of Magic”: “They do not exist; and thus they are all that matter.” (For an incredibly long time, even after entering college, I carried this quotation as a sort of mantra, constantly reflecting back on it because I felt that it captured so well the importance of make believe, which I felt held more value than gold. I’m not sure if that has necessarily changed.) Perhaps instead of narrative, a better word choice would be “explanation”, since that is what attempts seem to be aimed for. Dorothy does find the answer to her wishes over the rainbow, doesn’t she?

Anyway: When I arrived at college everything as it was was put to a stop. My reading lists became that provided by my professors, and to an extent I just stopped really reading. Reading for myself seemed incorrect when I had too many social gatherings to attend and materials to read for my classes. Alright, the second may have been a hollow concern, but the first certainly was on my mind. After my first couple of classes, I decided that my college education would be about laying down the foundation of what was to come. I would learn how to read so that I could read and write for myself. I’m thankful to be able to report that I learned much in doing both, and have landed myself in this current state: where I was before I went to college, with just a touch of insight.

Let’s hope that I’ve sowed the ground enough.

- Spider