Entertainment and Childhood

I took my nieces and nephew to see the three dimensional version of the movie Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs it was a cleverly written adaptation of  a popular children’s  book and had both a well written screenplay and excellent voice actors. The quality of the 3D experience was really excellent.  I really enjoyed the visit with my homeschooled (for this year) nieces and nephew who could go to a matinee. The film was a first for me. I had seen 3D I-Max (or imitators I am unsure now) films, 3D films at World’s fairs and have looked at 3D films in correlation with scientific seminars but had never seen a major commercial feature entertainment film in three dimensions at a theater or movie house. I enjoyed that experience .

We drove back to our place in the country where they live in a different house than I do on the same property. I know they enjoy the dogs, horses and fish here at Big Woods. They are also very well traveled.

However, today I remembered my own childhood which had its own joys and sorrows. I went to the wake of the grandfather of one of my closest early childhood friends. I remember riding minibikes at that family’s ranch, going out on their boat The  Escape for deep sea fishing and listening to the man I knew as Mr. Revis tell an occasional war story. My buddy and I did not always get along in those days and we have drifted apart over the years. Our grandfathers were in business together, Dannon and I went to school together and our mothers were good friends.

I was an avid freshwater fisherman as well as an occasional deep sea fisherman when I was a kid. I remember on time I was out at the back of my Dad’s family’s Lac Misere Farm fishing and my grandfather and Mr. Revis flew by in a light plane. They dropped me a shake and a cheeseburger as they flew by. It would be a better story if I could say the packages arrived perfectly in good order but in that living experience of food falling from the sky it was rather like the 3D movie. There was some damage although I did catch the food and drink more or less. It is remarkable enough that I got some eating and drinking out of the expereience. That was certainly an unusual experience. However, it was in keeping with the personality of the men who served in the military during World War II. Revis Greene Sirmon was the “Scatterbrain Kid” as was his plane when he was a fighter pilot. His zest for life and willingness to take chances were telltale signs of his years as a fighter pilot in combat. Whatever else he was he could take the time to bring some magic to a kid’s life. I hope he rests in peace and that the country and world he leaves behind becomes a better and not a worse place.