Back in 1999 one of the movie review sites I visit (probably www.stomptokyo.com) mentioned a website for a movie called The Blair Witch Project. I checked it out and was immediately hooked. I sent the page to all of my co-workers and friends with an interest in movies and saw it opening week. And i really, really enjoyed it. During the credits, though, I noticed that it was produced by a guy named Gregg Hale.
"Huh," thought I, "I had a close friend named Gregg Hale. I wish I'd kept track of him."
Like much else from those years, the thought of finsing my friend never quite took - the pressure from my aneurysm was getting severe, making me forgetful and unable to focus. If I had only known....
Gregg and I went to the Defense Language Institute together in 1985-86 where we were in class together, studying the Farsi language. We both loved Japanese food and drinking, so we hung out a lot. He introduced me to punk music and the ideological aspects of cultural dissent. He was 2-3 years older and we had a lot of fun hanging out, going to the e-club, and playing D&D. After DLI I went to the 519th at Ft. Bragg and he went to 5th Special Forces Group, also at Bragg. 5th Group eventually moved to Ft. Campbell and I lost touch. At the time my first marriage was collapsing, so I had little opportunity to track him down and, after, my illness kept me from thinking too much about anything.
Well, about 4 months ago I'm trying to track down someone else when I encounter an email address for a Gregg Hale. Not too hopeful, I dashed off an email - and it is my old friend! Very cool.
I asked, and found out, that he was, indeed, the producer of The Blair Witch Project. Super cool.
Which brings us to the meat of today's entry. Monday night my wife, who is certainly NOT a fan of horror movies, or even just scary movies, finally sat down to watch Blair Witch with me. I pop in the DVD and hit play.
She stopped actually watching the movie during the events of the second night. As the characters were preparing to camp for the fifth night, she finally demanded that I turn off the movie and leave all the lights on. I was further instructed, quote, "Tell your friend Gregg that I don't really like him much right now," end quote.
I'm pretty sure Gregg will be happy to hear that.
The story keeps on going, though. Tuesday morning at breakfast Jen is kinda' mad that I "made" her watch as much as she did. Our oldest, Jack (who is 6 years old), asked to watch the movie with me. Jen told him, "Remember how the movie Them scared you so badly? This is 100 times scarier."
Jack's eyes got really big and he asked, "Does it have ants 100 feet tall?"
While Jen tried to hide her laugh, I chimed in, "Well, you really don't see what is after the characters, you just... hear things."
Jack smiled and said, "Oh, just like Forbidden Planet. I loved the part where the Monster from the Id left those scary footprints in the sand. That was awesome."
He immediately jumped down from his chair and ran off to play "Monsters from the Id" with his brothers.
Jen and I were laughing quietly while I beamed with pride over my son's knowledge of horror and science fiction film. Even Jen was impressed, considering Jack saw Forbidden Planet only once and that was more than a year ago.
Dinner table discussions of theology, science, horror films, and science fiction. Such is life in a home full of geeks. I wouldn't trade it for NASCAR and wrestling for all the money in the world.
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