Think back to a time before Hulu or YouTube. A time before there were hundred's of mindless television shows on satellite or cable. DVD's were unheard of and VCR's were just starting to make its debut. TV mostly consisted of 3 to 4 stations and if you were lucky you may have even squeezed an extra station on the lower dials. Some know what I am talking about and if you do then you can remember a time when a movie night was a family event.
Around every holiday you can expect to see some type of Charlie Brown show. Christmas time was especially grand because not only was there a Charlie Brown show but a myriad of other Christmas specials. During the summer a station would host a regular movie to show like "Wizard of Oz" or "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory". Everybody would be settled in to view it. There was usually a child or two the next day who was disappointed in the fact that they missed the show and had to wait a whole year to try to catch it again. The year was worth the wait.
Mom would bathe us early and we would slip into our jammies. She would lay a sheet out on the livingroom floor and make up some Kool-aid. Usually it was grape or cherry. Right before the movie would start mom would pull out a pan to pop up some popcorn on the stove. Microwave popcorn was unheard of back then. Excitedly, my brother, sister and I would run between watching the popcorn in the kitchen and checking with the tv in the livingroom to see if any of the movie started yet. My mom lounged out on the couch and my sibilings and I had our own little picnic on the layed out sheet with our popcorn and Kool-aid.
Before you knew it, right at a good part, a commercial would appear. At times it would be too suspenseful and the wait for the show was agony. Other times a commercial break allowed for a quick trip to the bathroom or a discussion about what movie was showing.
Today you can boot up any movie or rent them commercial free. I think the movies have lost their appeal. It can be watched anytime. Some stations still try to keep up with tradition but kids today don't want to be bothered by commercials. When I watch a show from a DVD I can still tell where the commercial breaks are and I still expect that the movie would pause at that point. There isn't a fuss made about a movie on tv because somewhere in the hundreds of channels there is probably other movies showing. Time marches on and it is a different world we live in today but I am thankful that I have these to hold dear to my heart.
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