A True Love Story

Let me tell you about a true story that happened when I was ten and a half years old. In August of 1935, one Saturday morning I asked my mother if I could go to the movies. At that time it costs ten cents to get into the movies. This was a very large amount to me. After asking three or four times she finally gave me the dime. Mom was always a soft touch. I walked at least three or four miles to the Lowes Broadway Theater in Brooklyn. I did not know what was playing and I did not care, for I loved the movies. I left home at noon my mother told me t be back at three oclock. In those days they had a double feature which ran about three hours. God was with me on tht day because the feture film was Naughty Marietta starring Nelson Eddy and Jeanette McDonald. It is hard for me to explain my feelings that day when I firstheard them sing Ah Sweet Mystery of Life. I honestly couldn't move, I was spellbound and in love. I stayed there until the theater closed at midnight. When I returned home my mother looked at me to make sure I was okay. She gave me a small smack on my backside and sent me off to bed. At that point I was the happiest ten and a half year old in the world. The very next day I got up and asked my mother for another dime to go to the movies. Unfortunately my poor mother did not have a dime to give me. With seven children to feed every dime was needed for food. After explaining to me that she did not have a dime to give me I starte to cry. I said "Mom, I just have to see this movie." My mother being a soft touch went to our neighbor and borrowed a dime. Again she then told me to be back around three o'clock so she wouldn' worry. So I began the three to four mile trip to the Lowes Broadway Theater. After I paid and sat down my heart began to beat fast as I waited for the movie to begin. I saw the movie five times. I finally arrived home at one tirty in the morning. This time my father was there [also a soft touch]. He checked me to make sure I was alright and then gave me two smacks on my backside and he said this was for worring your mother and me. Then he sent me off to bed.My memory of this story still remains as vivid as if it happened yesterday. Sixty-eight years have passed and I still say to myself,"It was still worth everything to see that movie. Today at the age of seventy-nine I am still the happiest kid in the world. I have accumulated evey movie they made, I own every musical recording in triplicate. Now after 68 years of li8stening to their magical sounds I continue to love them as I did that very first time when I was the happiest ten and a half year old
in the world.

A true love story by Jack Gitlitz of Boynton Beach Florida