Location (while drinking):

Neighbor's Porch

Activity (while drinking):

Conversation

Food?

No

People Present?

Yes, Seven (including me)

The Scene:

As often as I have seen Neighbor Paul and gotten to know him since moving into Turners Falls, MA, I had heretofore never sat on his porch. Wine Allergic Girlfriend and I are committed porch people, not to be confused with deck or patio people. Deck and patio people hide in the back with their grills and lawn games. Us porch people, along with our balcony brethren, like to see the street. We like to watch stuff and we don't mind being a little more public about it. We aren't as friendly as the stoop sitters, but we wave and nod when people pass by.

NOW: if this were a well-considered essay rather than an attempt to capture in a blog post the scene and thoughts while drinking wine on Paul's porch, I would get into Race and Class here (with definite capital letter beginnings). Adventures in Babysitting basically plays into a white suburban person's fear of black and poor people. In most cases, the Babysitter's fear is unjustified and the crew receive help from places they don't expect it. But this is a blog post, and I haven't re-watched the movie for close viewing, and I have to go to work in like 15 minutes. So suffice it to say here that unlike Ferris Beuller's Day Off or Lampoon's Vacation, I could actually relate to the kids in Adventures in Babysitting, specifically the two teenage boys. And while I related to them, yes, in their suburban whiteness; what really connected me to them and their subsequent adventures was their absolute obsession with Elisabeth Shue. I remember rewinding the beginning of the movie over and over again because I was so taken with Shue and her humongous t-shirt and little head bops.

And because my teenage animal brain connected to Shue in much the same way these teenage boys did, I somehow took their adventures more seriously. They actually informed opinions of mine about cities and what was scary about them. Not crazy, deep-seated opinions about race or class; more like a feeling about cities and the quality of danger associated with cities in the 80s. Sort of how the "Just Say No" campaign gave cocaine a certain kind of dangerous feeling without actually making me form an opinion about it; Adventures in Babysitting created in me a feeling about cities. It was personality forming.

Paul invited us over and even though it was a weekday, Stepson was away for the week doing something outdoorsy and age-appropriately adventurous, so we had no problem going over spontaneously. Neighbor Dawn joined us, and each of us brought a bottle of white wine (see above).

The porch conversation was pleasant and funny—Paul talked about a recent trip to Italy as well as gave a five minute lecture on the importance of hot pants in The Poseidon Adventure. (If you wear hot pants you will be safe, even in the most harrowing of boat tragedies.) Paul called The Poseidon Adventure "personality forming", a phrase that started W.A.G., Dawn and I thinking about our personality-forming movies. I declared that "personality forming" movies differed from movies you simply liked a lot. There had to be something taken away almost involuntarily from the movie that somehow affected later life moments or decisions. Put that way, I realized how influential Adventures in Babysitting had been on me (see sidebar).

We drank wine and eventually other friends rode up on their bikes and the neighbor's across the street saw that we were out there and came on over. At one point a dog from across the street ran up to see Paul's dog who was lying at our feet. The owner of the dog yelled at him to come back, but the dog didn't respond; eventually, the owner had to just come on to the porch himself and pick the dog up.