If there’s one thing sad about getting older — note I didn’t say “old” — it’s the things you love that disappear from your life.
I’m not talking about the things that relate to aging. I used to be able to make 18-foot jump shots consistently, but that was when I was 20 or 21.
No, what I mean is that there were things I used to enjoy a great deal that I don’t do anymore, and there’s really no reason I couldn’t do them.
Things like going to the movies.
In the first 15 years or so of our marriage, my wife and I would go to the movies almost every weekend. We had an eight-screen multiplex exactly one mile from our house in California, so we could go out the door five minutes before a movie was scheduled to start and still get there on time.
Well, we’re in our 12th year living in Georgia, and we have a multiplex six miles away.
We’ve gone once, and that was five years ago.
I went to a movie by myself the year after that.
Four years ago.
Obviously, with streaming video and a 55-inch UHD television, the alternatives aren’t bad, but with the Academy Awards scheduled for Sunday night, I was amazed to see how few of the nominees I have actually seen.
One.
“West Side Story,” which I watched on my iPhone, mostly because I loved the original when I was 11 and wanted to compare the two. As lovely as Natalie Wood was, she couldn’t pass for Puerto Rican.
I didn’t see any of the other nominees, and I still haven’t seen any of the films nominated in 2020 or 2019.
The only 2018 nominee I saw was “Vice,” and that was only because I really like Amy Adams.
I saw only “The Post” of the 2017 nominees and “Arrival” (Amy Adams again) of the 2016 films.
I did see two of the 2015 films — “The Martian” and “Spotlight” — and “Spotlight” is the most recent Best Picture winner I saw.
It’s not that I don’t have any of the others. I’ve been meaning to watch last year’s winner, “Nomadland,” but somehow I never get around to it.
I still love movies, but I find myself far more attracted to older ones, even if I’ve seen them several times before. I also have my guilty pleasures. Just yesterday I watched Kevin Costner’s mediocre bicycling movie “American Flyers” for maybe the dozenth time.
Go figure.
The last movie nominated for Best Picture that I ever saw in a theater was “Toy Story 3” back in 2010, and the last Oscar winner I saw in a theater was “Slumdog Millionaire” in 2008.
And of course, if you haven’t seen the nominees, there isn’t much point in watching the show.
Especially since Amy Adams isn’t nominated for anything this year.