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Sunday, January 12, 2003 A friend was in town this weekend -- Curtis, an American who's been living and working in Pamplona for the last several years. (See journal entries for March 8-26, 2002.) We make telephone contact yesterday morning, I find out that he and David, a mutual friend, have decided to go see Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers later in the day. I immediately announce I'm going along, then call David -- yet another American -- who was going to procure tickets via the internet. He's married to Maria, a lovely Spanish woman -- she answers the phone, it's obvious they're both still in bed. (11:30 a.m. Not so unusual here.) I swap greetings with her, David gets on the line, arrangements are made. I have lunch with Curtis in a neighborhood joint. Afterwards, we slog through la Plaza de la Puerta del Sol and up the hill to the cinema, get on line. David finally shows up with Maria and her sister. A few minutes of chat, then Maria and her sister head off for shopping (this being the season of las Rebajas) and whatever, the three males head into the theater. David bought tickets with typical Spanish seating – about 2/3 of the way back. I see this and immediately start agitating -- politely, I hope -- to move closer to the screen. A tall male sits in the seat in front of me, my view of the screen is drastically diminished, my lobbying for a change of location continues. The theater is less than half-full (first showing of the day), David and Curtis kindly consent to change seats so that we're 8 or 9 seats from the front instead of 18 or 19. (Yee-ha!) We sit through a few minutes of ads, before we know it the film gets underway. This was my second time seeing the bugger (likewise for Curtis; the third time for David – yes, I admit it, we're Lord of The Rings nerds), and the difference for me with the second viewing was that I experienced the story more deeply, found myself, in fact, sucked into it, involved in it far more than I did the first time around. I felt the accumulating intensity of it more this time around, and I have to say, the way it builds to the final 40-minute battle of Helms Deep is done with fine, subtle pacing and skill. (In my humble, ignorant opinion, anyway, for what doubtful value it has.) And whereas I found myself at the end of my first viewing cracking wise about the body count, this time the slaughter and relentless conflict reminded me of the long, brutal battle that finishes out Saving Private Ryan, only on a broader, more epic scale. I was glad it was over, frankly, and found myself relieved to step out of the theater into the cold January air of Madrid, life going on all around. David and Curtis whip out cellphones and begin jabbering away, I watch cars going past, people walking by. It was good to be there, the city's evening activity swirling around us. We walked a few blocks to hook up with Maria and her sister, wound up sitting in a coffee joint, cigarette smoke in the air, dance music playing loudly, and it may be that all three of us needed to shake off the film, with its intensity and loss of life, because the conversation not only went nowhere heavy, it quickly went to places decidedly trivial and profane -- us maybe blowing out the psychic vents, so to speak. Stereotypes about Spaniards, then men and women in general, began flying, leading to a passage in which Curtis and David began elaborating re: the stereotypes around men and bathrooms: men don't notice the colors in bathrooms, you won't find a hand towel in a man's bathroom, men care far less about hygiene and their mode of dress than women. (For what it's worth, I notice the colors in bathrooms, there is a hand towel in my bathroom. I mentioned that, Curtis/David immediately pointed out that I live in the barrio of Chueca, meaning that life in a barrio with a substantial gay population has had an effect on my lifestyle, blahblahblah.)(Of course it's ridiculous -- I'm just reporting what happened.) At some point, more explicit tales of male lack-of-hygiene surfaced (WARNING: FOUL MOMENT APPROACHING!!), David mentioning that a Spanish male he knew once found himself in a restaurant men's room, winding up the heavier of the two possible intestinal evacuation procedures, with no toilet paper in sight. According to David, the guy grabbed a toilet brush to finish up with, a claim that provoked a shower of rude puns ("That was a dirty crack!" "That wrecked ‘im!" "Cheeky bugger!" "Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘brush after every meal!'") Out in the street afterwards, I found that between all of it – coffee, music, people, conversation, low humor – I'd managed to shake off the heaviness I brought out of the theater with me, felt lighter, more present. Whatever gets the job done. From there, Maria wanted to show David a coat she'd seen earlier, we trooped over to join the Saturday night multitude in el Corte Inglés, where I found myself in the middle of crowds of Spanish women – not a bad place to be. They're lovely, Spanish women. Interesting, animated, fun to watch. Not a bad way to pass a Saturday evening, that -- in a crowded store, smack in the center of the Iberian peninsula, surrounded by females. Surrounded by life. Worked okay for me. rws 3:39 PM [+]
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