Drive-In Discovered

This morning we decided to have a little family time together and go for a drive with the new camera. We had no real destination and just took off driving, looking for interesting things along the way.

One of the neat things about North Carolina, that is so incredibly different than the area of Pennsylvania where I grew up, are the dilapidated farm shacks along the country roads. There is something so sad and historic about them. It makes me want to go into the restoration business and fix up every one!

As we were passing some of these barns, there was an interesting sign that caught my eye. We pulled over to get a closer look. It said "Cairo" in art-deco letters and appeared to be a movie theater marquee. Since it was sitting beside an abandoned old store, we didn't think too much about it. You know, people leave odd things behind. We poked around a little more.

Then I saw a something around back that looked like a billboard. My husband realized that it was a little bigger than a billboard. It was a drive-in theater screen! Of course - this place used to be a drive-in movie theater!

As it turns out, this was the Cairo Drive-In Movie Theater of Fuquay-Varina, NC. It was open for several years in the 1970's and could hold about 250 cars.

How bizarre it was to discover a drive-in on a random Sunday drive in January. It just brings to mind the amazing history of every crumbling barn that we pass on old country roads. It's too bad they all don't have a little sign to commemorate their interesting past.

I was reading a fascinating article in the January issue of National Geographic about abandoned buildings in the Midwest (see The Emptied Prairie - awesome!). Schoolhouses with books, desks and even faded lessons still scrawled on chalkboards. Homes with doilies still placed neatly on dusty, cracked furniture. Rusty cars found swallowed by wild grasses. It's so fascinating to think of the story behind, or literally, inside the building.

I wish we could have found out more on the Cairo Drive-In theater. But, I imagine it's just about the same to these stories. Check out this great clip (only 3 minutes!) we found on old drive-in theaters. My husband, who is a few years older than I am, remembers more about the drive-ins. How they would see a double feature... The first show was for the kids, the second movie for the adults. He and his brothers would be ordered to go to sleep before the second half. I only have vague memories of falling asleep in the backseat with the aroma of popcorn in the air and flickering lights all around.

When we lived in California, my husband and I went to see a move at the drive-in theater in Oakland. I liked walking to the concessions stand on a warm summer evening and being outside with all the other movie-goers. It was nice to be able to take off my shoes and get comfy in the car. It was fun, even if they got the reels mixed up and we watched the end of the movie before the middle! Oh well - the hazards of the drive-in I suppose!

I've posted more photos of our little adventure on Sunniviews. Anyone else with fond memories of the drive-ins?

True Inspiration

My daughter takes a wonderful clogging class at a little dance studio down the road. This is her second year. When the new season started this fall, we didn't buy her new shoes. I kinda thought she'd be okay for awhile but felt it looming in the distance. It was one of those vague things that hangs around the back of your mind like fog and never really materializes. I just kept forgetting!

Until about 3 weeks ago when she started complaining that her toes hurt. The signs for used clogging shoes had disappeared from the studio walls by then and I had heart palpitations just thinking about the cost of new ones. But I knew we had to do something - my daughter started taking off her shoes in class and was clogging in socks!

So my husband made a several calls and found a discount place south of town. Of course we got lost trying to find the it, making illegal u-turns on dirt roads and frantically getting directions on cell phones. They closed at 5:00 and we got there one minute before.

Fortunately the proprietors were an older couple who didn't mind staying open a little longer for frantic parents of a clogger! They were so nice. For 25 years they had their own clogging team that toured the east coast. With great expertise they fitted her little happy dancing feet. As a bonus, they not only had the clogging taps in stock, but hammered them on for us in the back! We were so relieved and my daughter was hopping around like a jumping bean from excitement (she does that a lot!)

With such a huge weight lifted from my shoulders, I stopped for gas on the way home. As I was standing there enjoying the crisp fall air and watching the sun set in the distance, I happened to notice the sign beneath the gas prices that usually announce the store discounts on sodas and potato chips. Here is what it said...

BUILD YOUR LIFE AROUND THOSE WHO MATTER

I took a deep breath of the chilly autumn air and said a prayer of gratitude for such blessings. Not just for the shoes or for the wonderful couple that we just met, but also for the owners of a gas station who choose to inspire rather than promote. And how amazing it was to see such true inspiration at the end of hectic day.

Focus

Why is it that when you close your eyes, food tastes so much better? When we go out for sushi, our whole little threesome family closes our eyes while we're eating, making yummy sounds. Even now, I'm sitting here having a bite of a Twix bar and when I close my eyes, it's the sweetest, most delightful thing I've ever tasted.

I think if I didn't look so weird doing it, I might close my eyes all the time to eat.

That reminds me of a movie, American Beauty. In one scene, the boy takes a video of a grocery bag swirling around in the wind. Blowing up and down, around in circles, like it was playing with the leaves. It's so mezmorizing, watching that bag dancing with the wind.

Sometimes when I'm at a stop light, I'll observe the trees or the clouds slowly passing in the sky. It occurs to me that if I had a video camera taping the leaves fluttering in the trees or the branches swaying and bowing in the wind, it might be the most inspiring video ever seen. The difference, I think, is watching it without distraction. Like viewing it through a tube or from a box. No cars or pedestrians passing by. No horns blowing. No one watching. Just me and the tree. Or just me and a dancing grocery bag.

There is a quote by a zen monk named Cheri Huber. She's this amazing woman - funny, spritely, not at all what I imagine a zen monk to be. (See http://www.cherihuber.com/) Cheri says "The quality of your life is determined by the focus of your attention."

I heard this quote last year but I don't think I really got it until recently. I've noticed that when I'm completely focused on a task, when I don't allow any distractions but think only of what I'm doing, things get done so much faster, so much more easily, with such high quality results.

When I'm driving and completely focused, I can avoid all sorts of potential accidents, I never jerk the car to a stop and never get stuck in an intersection. Same thing at work, it's amazing how much I can get done with so little mistakes.

The most interesting thing about focusing on the present moment, is that my face and body completetly relax. When my mind is spinning endlessly, I'll tell myself to stop, be present, see, smell and feel everything around me right then. The muscles on my face relax when I didn't even realize how pinched they were. My skin feels soft and clear, like there's not a wrinkle in sight. I can imagine what Anne Rice was talking about when she described the vampires as having alabaster skin. Completely flawless. Alabaster. (I love that word!) Relaxed with no anxiety, no stress, no problems to solve.

So, I keep on focusing, being present. Maybe I'll even start closing my eyes when I eat. I mean, really, it doesn't bother me to yoga in the middle of the treadmills at the Planet Fitness. Or drive around with blinking red and green lights strung through my bike rack on my car at Christmas. I notice at I get older that I'm less and less self-conscious. But, that's a separate post.

For now, I enjoy the trees blowing in the wind, the sight of a dancing grocery bag and the bite of a Twix bar.