Last Saturday night, a group of us decided on the spur of the moment to go to dinner and to see a movie. The movie we wanted to see, Slumdog Millionaire, was not playing locally since we live in an area that seemingly can only sustain movies geared towards children, teens, and unthinking adults. So Jean, the ringleader of this expedition, found that the closest theater showing this movie was at the Rockaway Mall, an hour’s drive to the east of us. As long as we were driving that far, it seemed sensible to include dinner in the plan so we rendez-vous-ed at five so that we could carpool to the Olive Garden (also in the Rockaway Mall) by six, and then catch the seven-thirty show.

Everything proceeded according to plan until we exited I-80 and turned into the mall at which point it became clear that something was afoot since there was a veritable frenzy in the air augmented by the flashing lights from a zillion (the new billion) cars going every which way. Still, we didn’t panic, but headed in an orderly fashion to the entrance of the Olive Garden where we got a frisson when it was evident there wasn’t a parking spot anywhere in the vicinity. Still, we remained positive, and while my husband went to park the car, we jostled our way to the hostess and said we’d like a table for four whereupon we were told it would be an eighty to eighty-five minute wait, whereupon we did an about-face and ended up on the curb where the temperature was an inhospitable three degrees. As I called my husband to tell him to forget parking the car, I sent Jean back inside to get a restaurant recommendation from the hostess since it looked like there was nothing else on the horizon. She came back and reported that there was a restaurant in Macy’s or the Mexican Grill. When the car pulled up, we hopped in with the alacrity of bank robbers, and as we inched along, my husband commented that this was where the bailout money must have ended up.

Somehow, we just couldn’t bring ourselves to eat in Macy’s so we opted for the Mexican Grill which was ominously empty when we arrived, but soon filled to capacity with other Olive Garden escapees for whom eighty minutes was a tolerable wait but eighty-five was inconceivable. The Mexican Grill was actually quite a nice restaurant and since it was self-service we finished our meal well in advance of the movie start, so off we headed to Brookstone Cream, another deserted eatery (quel surpris at three degrees), where my friends gorged themselves on ice cream before heading towards the movie theater where we were in for another shock.

I guess I’d thought the Olive Garden was full of happy shoppers celebrating the end of a long, hard day of economy boosting, but no, they were just plain pleasure seekers as were the hordes of movie goers thronging the entrance of the theater like Oscar night at the Eastman Kodak. But since hope springs eternal we sent my husband off to park the car while we bought the tickets which turned out to be as challenging as shooting the rapids. First of all there were no discernable lines inside the lobby, just one big mass of milling yet purposeful people. I hopped back outside where there was a discernable line leading to a machine where you could purchase your ticket with a credit card. As I stood, I overheard the people behind me repeatedly saying in a bemused way that they’d never seen so many people here before – ever—and then I heard the people in front of me say that the seven-thirty show of Slumdog Millionaire was sold out so I ran back inside and found Jean and friend who was next in line at another machine. After consulting an electronic board hung high on the opposite wall like the train schedule at Grand Central, and quickly conferring, since the crowd was getting restless –everyone it seemed was dead set on seeing a movie NOW – we agreed on Gran Torino which had just changed status from “sold out” to “available,” and without stopping to question why that might be since we were swept up in the drama of the moment like homesteaders racing to stake out a parcel of land, we pounced and bought four tickets just as my husband arrived, somewhat dazed as though he had just escaped a tsunami, and raced across the lobby and down the hall to theater number thirteen where two people were just exiting because there were no seats together and the movie had already started.

My husband was all for returning the tickets and hightailing it out of there but, like a child who’d had too much sugar, I couldn’t let go of my forward momentum and began frenziedly lobbying that we turn our tickets in for another movie. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed so we pushed back through the lobby, where the hordes were still poring in, out into the parking lot, where cars were circling like they were looking for someone to drag race, and finally, ensconced in the warm confines of the car, peace descended once again.

Jean, who is newly divorced, said, “Here I was bragging to the ex that I was going out for a big night on the town. Well, we almost got to eat at the Olive Garden, and we almost got to see a movie. The only thing we got to do was eat ice cream on a three degree night.” And I wondered, is that a metaphor for our economy.