SUNDAY SHOPPING
A while ago my brother and I were driving past a shopping mall on Easter Sunday. It was odd seeing the parking lot completely empty.
“Y’know,” my brother would say, “It reminds me of the time before they had Sunday shopping.”
“That’s true,” I added, because I never pass up an opportunity to speak, “like when we were kids!”
Sunday shopping in Quebec is a relatively new thing that began in the late-eighties. When we were young, the law strictly forbade Sunday shopping so that people would have no choice to attend church. On the other hand Saturday shopping was heavily encouraged, most likely to annoy Non-Christians.
In the mid-to-late seventies my family would sometimes visit the closed shopping malls. I know that sounds strange, but allow me to elaborate.
My father was an extremely hard-working taxi driver. He had to work Saturdays, but Sundays were slow enough that he could take most of the day off and not miss any business, because as I said earlier, everyone else was at church. So on rainy, dreary days when we didn’t go to the park or do some other family activity, we would go to the closed malls and do some window shopping, checking out things we could never afford. The malls often contained restaurants, pharmacies or grocery stores that were not bound by oppressive, out-dated, religious laws, so their doors would be open even on the Sabbath. And on occasions like Easter-time they would have petting zoos, or other activities.
I was just a boy of six or seven back then, but I enjoyed it. We went mostly to either Les Galleries D’Anjou or The Fairview Centre in Pointe-Claire. Sometimes I would come across a really cool toy store and want to come back when it was open. I’d ask my mom or dad if we could, and they’d say yes, most likely just to shut me up, because they’d never bring me back on a business day.
That sort of family outing always suited my dad just fine, because he was…how do I put this nicely…somewhat careful with a dollar? No, that’s not quite right. I know! My dad would squeeze a penny so hard that the little Queen Elizabeth II on it would scream “OWW! Bloody hell!” What he liked best about those outings is that they didn’t cost much.
One day they opened an arcade at the Fairview Centre. My father hated places like that. He thought they were like casinos: A cheap thrill and a total waste of time and money. However looking back now, I must admit I agree with him. When my brother and I saw the arcade, we begged him for some quarters. He eventually relented, and after we spent them, we went back and hit him up for more. When he refused, my brother got angry and I threw a total shit-fit. My parents took us straight home, and we never went to Fairview as a family again.
On the rare occasion we actually had to buy something and a visit to the mall was unavoidable, my father would run it like a military commando raid. First, he would scout out the location alone and find what we needed at a price he could live with. Then he would return with my mother, brother and I for the purchase. He wanted us in and out as quickly as possible, so no one would get hurt, and so we wouldn’t see anything else we’d like to buy or another store we’d like to browse. My father was a pragmatist who saw browsing as a superficial and contemptible activity. He could never understand why people would look at items in a store that were neither a necessity nor affordable. My mother, on the other hand, loved to browse, especially the expensive stuff, although I think she’d do it just to raise my father’s blood pressure a few points.
I was so used to seeing the mall closed that being there during business hours became a totally different experience for me; like visiting some parallel universe. The mall was alive! Stores were bright and open, the walkways were full of people, and there was music playing (albeit elevator music). I wasn’t so dazzled when I went to Disney. It was as if I was through the looking glass.
When we would buy a piece of furniture, or some other large item, my father would absolutely refuse to pay to have it delivered.
“No way am I going to pay some salababeech, facking-bastar to do that! Never!” he’d proudly proclaim.
Fortunately it was the seventies, and the cars back then were colossal. My dad owned a Chevy Impala so monstrous that the U.S. Navy offered to buy it from him for use as an aircraft carrier. That car was so big that at one point while on a car-trip to Florida, my father, brother, myself and my mom were all sitting on the bench-sized front seat with plenty of room left over.
The car was a former Surete du Quebec cruiser that still had police markings when my father bought it. He decided not to pay to have it painted, opting instead to paint it himself using house paint and a vacuum cleaner. Miraculously he did an excellent job, but the colour, a glistening green, annoyed my mom.
If what we bought at the mall was large, my father had my brother and I help him. He did most of the heavy lifting, though. While my father was not a large man, he was very strong. When at age fifteen, he had a job manually hauling loads of bricks to construction sites.
Once we got it to the car, whatever we bought never, ever, not one single time, ever, fit in the massive trunk.
“No problem,” Dad would say. He would then just shove the item as deep into the truck as he could and say “okay, let’s go!”
One of us would always object and ask if maybe we should tie it with rope. I mean, it would be balanced rather precariously with more sticking out than in. One bump on the road and…
“Ah, it’s okay. Let’s go!”
My brother and I would kneel on the backseat and watch the load out the rear window, worried that it would fall out on the highway. My father drove fast and liked to weave through traffic. The trunk lid would bob up and down as he started and stopped, but by god we never lost our cargo and always made it home safely.
“See! I told you!” he’d say.
Years later I would be working at a mall managing a record store. One rainy, morbid Sunday I closed the store alone and was hit with a haunting, déjà vu episode as I was leaving. I looked around empty, unlit stores and kiosks and saw no one. I stopped dead in my tracks and for a moment I was travelling back in time. I could see my brother jumping from bench to bench. My mom and dad walking together hand in hand. A reflection of me as a child in the window of a darkened store. It was a warm feeling like I had not experienced in years. I stood there for a few minutes, and just absorbed the surroundings. Then it slipped away into the dreary Sunday evening.
THE POWER OF NEGATIVE THINKING
In the service industry, one must always wish his or her client a nice day somewhere near the end of the transaction, usually after saying “Thank you for choosing…” If my customer seems to have a good sense of humour, I sometimes say “Have a nice day. I had a nice day once. It was really great!” Most of the time they are amused.
Those who know me best often refer to me as “cynical” or “pessimistic” or “negative”. I prefer to think of myself as a realist: Someone who analyzes the situation, and accurately calculates a reasonable prediction of future events and possible outcomes based on a combination of logic, intuition, and past experiences (both my own and those of others). I believe every day holds infinite possibilities; every action has infinite rewards; and every mistake can result in infinite consequences. My philosophy is best described as wish for the best, but brace for the worst.
But why do my friends see me as a cynic?
Because what I show the world is the exact opposite. I outwardly complain that all will be disastrous (brace for the worst), meanwhile I secretly imagine a fantastic conclusion (and there’s the hope for the best part).
Why do I do this? Where does it come from?
For me it started during that traumatic period of time popularly referred to as “childhood”.
When I was about nine years old, my parents planned to attend a party at the home of one of their goofball friends, and they wanted to drag me and my brother along for the ride. We used to live next door to those people, and while I hadn’t seen them in years, I remembered what a horde of annoying morons they were. And their youngest son was a drooling idiot. You probably already guessed I was just a tad reluctant to go.
I acted like a brat and tried to resist as best I could, thinking all along I would have nothing less than a horrible time. I expressed it aloud to my parents and brother (who was, as usual, silently resigned to his fate) but it was to no avail. I dreaded every moment until we arrived.
At the party the adults stayed upstairs in the den, while all the kids hung out in the basement. I was pleasantly surprised by three things that made a world of difference: First, the kid seemed to have kicked his drooling habit, and had smartened up a bit, (heck, he was even fun); second, there were other kids at the party about my age who were pretty cool; and third, they had an Atari.
Something else happened that I had not anticipated: I had a great time. By the end of the evening, I didn’t want to leave. My parents had to drag me out kicking and screaming.
“You! You’re such an enigma,” my father said, “first you don’t want to go; now you don’t want to leave! What’s the matter with you!?!”
A few years later I started high school. All through grade six I couldn’t wait to get there, and be like the big kids. I looked forward to being in an environment where I without doubt believed I would flourish, be popular, and make cool friends. It was all I talked about the entire summer of 1982.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. My five years at Outremont High School remain to this day the most miserable time of my life so far. They were a horrifying nightmare. They were, as the French would say, un desastre…une catastrophe!
While the aforementioned incidents were not the only times in my childhood I experienced a pleasant surprise or major letdown, they do best exemplify the pattern my life has followed. Whenever I’d say everything’s going to be incredibly great, I’d end up disappointed. Whenever I’d say it will be terrible, it more often proves not to be so. I felt that I had stumbled upon the secret to manipulating Fate! I believed Fate was consistently trying surprise me with the antithesis of whatever I expected.
After grade seven, I decided to put my theory to the test. I started going around saying things like “Oh, this’ll never happen…” or “That’ll never happen…I just know it!” to anyone within earshot. Sometimes I was right, sometimes I was wrong, but I was never let down. I no longer felt the emotional sting of an unexpected, crushing defeat. In fact, even the smallest of successes made me feel good. And great victories made me euphoric! It was enough to encourage me to continue my outwardly cynical, negative, and pessimistic ways.
So from then on every time there was something I really wanted, I would tell anyone who’d listen that it was unattainable. Whenever I won, I believed I pulled one over on Fate. Whenever there was something I didn’t want to happen, I would do the opposite, and bang! It wouldn’t happen, or at least no be as bad as I had predicted.
The advantage of being a pessimist is that I am never disappointed. You say the Anti-Christ is coming, that the apocalypse is on its way, etc…, so that anything less falls under the category of “pleasant surprise”. And if the worst happens, well I brag that I had predicted it all along, thus making myself seem smarter. Either way, I couldn’t possibly lose.
No matter how sunny, positive and hard working optimists might be, they will not always win. They have to deal with the occasional defeat just like the rest of us. Fate, you see, can often be difficult to predict. Its finger could point in anyone’s direction at any time. Who do you think is better prepared? A cynic like me, or an unrealistic, fantasy-world dwelling optimist?
The most positive person I know is my best friend Nick, and yes, he is more successful and happy than I am. But he also inhabits some parallel universe that is not unlike a rosy, impressionistic painting of the reality the rest of us have to contend with. Allow me elaborate.
I recall one time a few years ago I was in search of an inexpensive used car. Nick told me his brother-in-law was selling a late model Honda, adding it had “Just a little bit of rust on it.” I looked forward to buying the car based solely on Nick’s positive description. When I finally saw the vehicle, I was shocked to find it had more rust than paint. In fact, huge chunks of the car’s body were missing. There was a sizable dent in its roof (how that happened I’ll never understand) and the front bumper was loose and dangling so low on the driver’s side that the wheel rubbed against it when I made right turns during the test drive.
Nick had nothing to gain or lose if I had bought the car, and to this day I fully believe it was his skewed view of reality and propensity towards optimism that led him to describe the old Honda the way he did.
Another example that stands out in my memory: A number of years ago Nick, his girlfriend Nat, and I were taking a vacation on the Jersey shore. We were enjoying a day at the beach in Wildwood, when I noticed some dark, ominous storm clouds far away over the ocean were heading straight for us. Nat and I agreed we should pack up and leave. Nick confidently proclaimed the storm would miss us entirely.
It was a matter of minutes before the sun was obscured by the clouds. Nat and I collected our towels and the cooler, and started for the motel in defiance of Mr. Sunshine, who continued to deny it would rain.
During the entire walk back to our accommodations, he complained about how pessimistic we were, and because of that we would all miss out on a fun day at the beach.
“Nick,” I said, “it’s time for you to get two forms of I.D. and cash a reality cheque! Look at the sky, you fool! It’s going to rain! Don’t you hear the thunder?”
“No it won’t! You two are a couple of party poopers!” he retorted.
Moments after arriving at out motel, the clouds let loose the most powerful, violent thunderstorm I had ever witnessed. Nick had nothing more to say.
My theories on manipulating reality did work for a while, but Fate was still able to deliver the occasional sucker-punch.
There was a beautiful woman I was totally mad about. She was an absolute goddess. But there was one catch: She had a boyfriend. Now as a rule I never hit on someone else’s woman, so I played it cool, and laid back, keeping in touch with her without getting too close (lest she consider me “just a friend”). I didn’t obsess over her. I dated other women and otherwise went about my business, all the while keeping her in the back of my mind as a possibility, albeit a long shot.
Then one day, jackpot!
One evening while we were having dinner together, she informed me that her and her bozo boyfriend had taken the off-ramp to Splittsville a few months earlier (Yes!). But she also threw me a curve (Oh #%&*!): She was “sort of seeing” someone new. The use of the term “sort of seeing” implied to me that he was a transitional boyfriend she didn’t take seriously, and I had a realistic chance of winning it all.
I carefully considered three possible outcomes: A- She would unload the Joker she was “sort of seeing” in favour of me; B- She would go for that neophyte Clown (which would’ve meant she had deplorable taste); or C- She wouldn’t go for either of us, opting either for some new douche-bag, yahoo I didn’t know about, or to be on her own for a while.
I did the best I could to win her heart. I turned on all the charm I could muster. I was fantastic. And I got pretty close, too. However in the end, I lost. But the kicker was it wasn’t scenario A or B or C. It was D, of all things! She went back to her ex-boyfriend.
I never for a moment even considered that option. I thought I had all the angles covered; prepared for every eventuality. Cruel Fate had outsmarted me again!
I call instances like that a “Dave Draveky”.
Dave Draveky was a pitcher for the San Francisco Giants. He was an excellent ball player, and a class act. He had a family. He didn’t smoke, drink or even swear. He worked hard, and played by the rules. He said his prayers and took his vitamins. Then one day a doctor told him he had a cancerous growth on his throwing shoulder. They had to remove a third of the muscle he used when pitching a baseball. It took a while, but with hard work, determination and faith, he battled his way back to the big leagues.
Then one night, while pitching against the Expos in Montreal, he threw so hard that his arm shattered. I saw him writhe in agony on the mound. The damage to his arm was severe enough it had to be amputated. It was later revealed the injury had nothing to do with the cancer.
There was nothing anyone could’ve done. Fate (who is probably a Dodgers fan) was determined to end his baseball career.
His story is an example of how someone could do everything right, and still disaster could strike. The good news is that he never got down on himself. For him life went on, and I for one applaud Dave Draveky for being a brave man, well worthy of praise and respect.
It’s as if Fate is constantly looking for creative new ways to totally mess everyone up. Why did Dave Draveky’s arm explode? Why did high school have to be such a nightmare? Why did she go back to her ex?
But what could we do? Is there another way? Perhaps if I considered all possibilities? Or none?
I believe there is a way to defeat Fate; to become the master of my reality. And I will find it.
So my research continues. One day, I am confident I will figure out Fate. One day I will come upon that elusive magic formula to manipulate and control my destiny. And when I do, the world will be my oyster. As God is my witness, I will…nah! It’ll never happen! (wink nudge)
SPIKE
I was brushing my teeth on a cold autumn evening when out of the corner of my eye I saw something moving. Upon closer examination I discovered it was a spider crawling up my bathroom wall. I quickly ran to the kitchen and returned with a plastic cup and a dishwasher glove over my left hand. A week earlier I was at my friend Nick’s house as he was draining his pool and preparing his firewood pile for the winter. He killed every spider he came across, and seemed to enjoy doing it. I’ve always seen that sort of behaviour as cruel, opting rather to evict any insect or arachnid that finds its way into my home.
I easily captured the interloper in the cup and quickly moved to my front door. I turned on my porch light and tossed it onto my front steps. The spider was large enough that I saw exactly where she landed. I swiftly closed the front door and forgot about the whole thing, feeling like I had given the spider a fighting chance for life. It felt satisfying, as though I had done the morally correct thing.
The next morning, as I was leaving for work, I noticed the spider still on the front steps where I had left her. She was dead. I don’t know if I had accidentally squashed the spider in my attempt to corral her, or if she died from exposure to the cold. I didn’t know anyone who could perform an autopsy, but one thing was for sure: The spider died because of my actions.
The office building where I work has a security guard on duty 24/7. They are mostly older, overweight men who do little more than make rounds and listen to the radio in the guard room. On weekends and holidays, however, there was one guard who was not like the others.
Her name was Anne-Marie. She was around twenty when I first met her. She had really short blonde spiked hair (hence my giving her the moniker “Spike”), and wore heavy, black shoes. She was small, and the uniform the security company gave her was made for a larger man, which gave her the awkward appearance of a child wearing her big brother’s hand-me-downs.
I began to get to know her when I worked the four to midnight shifts on Saturdays. I would have my lunch at eight pm and would go to the building’s lunch room where there was a large colour TV with cable. She would be there at the same time to watch her favourite show, Cops. Spike only spoke French and I often interpreted what was said on the show for her, although a show like Cops really doesn’t need much explaining.
I got to know her over time and found out the during the weekdays she was studying to be a prison guard, was a black belt in Tae-Kwan-Do, and originally came from Granby.
Over time some of my co-workers like Phil, Christina and Michael got to know Spike as well. Most of the people in the office thought she was a lesbian, but I ended up knowing better.
After a while she started showing up in the cafeteria when I was there on Sundays as well and we’d talk. She would brag about what great shape she was in and would ask me to feel her biceps (which were rock solid). Spike, despite being confident and bold, was actually on a personal level very shy. She once bragged about how she had six-pack abs, and when I asked to see them, not thinking that she would actually do it, she immediately lifted the bottom half of the front part of her uniform and showed me (they looked like they were chiselled out of granite!). What I’ll never forget about that incident was her reaction afterwards. Her face turned red and she laughed uncomfortably. It was the first time she let down her guard in front of me and showed vulnerability.
It came to the point where I would go to the guard room during my breaks and spent time talking to her. She wanted to learn English, and I was giving her some practice, advice and lessons.
During some of our talks she would tell me about her knife and edged weapons collection. I asked her if she had ever played with dolls as a little girl. She immediately said no.
Despite her butch exterior, she did put on makeup and wore skirts when she went out. When I inquired if she had any high-heeled shoes or anything feminine like that, and she told me she only wore heavy shoes. When I asked why she told me it was in case she got into a fight.
A fight?
After seeing us together talking a few times some of the people from work thought she had a thing for me. I didn’t see it, but they said that I should pay attention to how she looked at me or the way her eyes lit up when I entered the room. I didn’t believe it until one day when I showed up at work and blew a friendly kiss towards the security camera at the front door. Spike immediately burst out of the office, smiling and blushing.
It was not that Spike was too butch or unattractive. It was that she was too young and not really right for me. I simply wasn’t in love with her. I would never hesitate to get involved with a mature woman in a non-serious relationship; she would know what she was in for. But I would never take advantage of a naïve young woman, especially one as sweet and nice as her. Spike, who always complained about how she could never find a fella, was romantically inexperienced and would end up getting hurt, and I didn’t want to do that. It felt satisfying, as though I had done the morally correct thing.
One Saturday I showed up and at Spike’s regular post was a fat, stupid slob security guard I had never seen before. When I asked where Anne-Marie was, he said that she was in the hospital after being hit by a car.
I was shocked. Then I was seriously concerned. I had no way of communicating with Spike. I didn’t have her home number, or know any of her friends or family. I hoped that it was just a minor thing and she was okay.
A week later I showed up for work and there she was at her post. I gave her a big, relieved hug. I should’ve known that it would take more than a car to stop her. She was indestructible.
Spike told me about how a car ran a red light and struck her as she was on her way to a night out with friends. She woke up in the hospital after being unconscious for several hours. After two days in bed, she got tired of being there, got out of bed, pulled out her I.V., and just walked out of the hospital. That was Spike.
I told her she should go back, that there could be some internal damage she didn’t know about. Spike just shrugged it off and was more concerned with making up the sixteen hours of work and school she missed because of the accident.
As I left work that day I ran into her at the elevator. I gave her “props” and as we touched knuckles she noticed how much bigger my hands were than hers. We then compared hand sizes. As we stood there palm touching palm, she blushed and smiled. Despite being strong and cut, she had small, delicate, feminine hands. Her feet were probably small as well, but one could not see that for the size of her shoes. I told her I would see her next weekend and as the elevator door closed I could see her shy, smiling face as she waved goodbye. I was glad Spike was back.
The following Thursday as I was leaving work I ran into one of the cleaning staff; a thin, scrawny little middle-aged guy who gossiped like a woman.
“Hey, did you hear about Anne-Marie?”
I though he was referring to her getting hit by a car, so I said “Yes, I know about her and the car.”
“No. She died on Wednesday,”
I froze. I became numb. My jaw hit the floor.
“Her mother called the security company. She died of a drug overdose or something. These kids today and their drugs, I tell ya.”
I felt like grabbing him by the throat and choking him like a chicken for what he said about her. What the hell was he talking about? He didn’t even know her! Spike didn’t take drugs. Sure, she smoked cigarettes, but she didn’t touch drink soft drinks and avoided most anything else that was unhealthy.
Days later rumours abounded that it was a suicide, but anyone who knew Spike knew that was impossible. She was the most optimistic of people. She always talked about how much she looked forward to her internship and eventually working in a prison and learning English and all the other things she wanted to do. Most likely she inadvertently overdosed on the prescription painkillers the doctors gave her for the pain and soreness she had after the accident.
Phil, Christina Michael and I tried to locate her obituary in Le Journal de Montreal or on the internet, but it was to no avail. We also tried to discover where and when the funeral was to be held, but by the time we found out it had already happened.
Sometimes I think about how if I had decided to take advantage of her she could’ve been with me that night and would not have been hit by that car; about how if I had done the wrong thing, she would still be alive; about the fragility of life; about her friendly smile.
I can’t walk past the security guard station without being reminded of all our talks and the times we spend together. She was only twenty-two. I try not to dwell on how she died, but rather remember who she was and how she lived.
You were my friend, Spike. And you are missed.
THE "DIE HARD" INCIDENT
Nick is my best friend in the world. I’ve known him since high school. In our twenty years as buddies, we have had so many adventures together I could write a book. Hell, I probably will one day.
If there is one event we bring up most often, it is an anecdote we usually tell while waiting in line at the movies when one of us has a new girlfriend. We refer to it as: The "Die Hard" Incident.
It all began one Sunday afternoon during the summer of 1988, in what started as a dreary, miserable, rainy day. We sat around trying to think of something to do, and consulted our local movie listings, eventually finding a title neither of us had seen. It was an action movie starring a TV actor I felt at the time to be annoying, obnoxious, and untalented.
“My brother saw this,” Nick said, “he liked it.”
“Okay, let’s go,” I answered.
The movie was playing at the Alexis Nihon Cinema. We went to the 3 pm showing. There was a fair sized crowd on hand, so I guessed we weren’t the only ones with nothing better to do. We managed to get a couple of pretty good seats.
“I’m going to the candy counter. Do you want anything?” Nick asked me.
“No,” I answered, “I’m good.”
“I’ll get you something.”
“No, Nick! I’m okay! Don’t get anything!”
Of course he returned a few minutes later with some popcorn and two large sodas. Large, even back then, was an understatement. They were mammoth, ten gallon drums of sugary cola! I wanted to tell Nick I didn’t want it, but what could I do? He couldn’t return it, so I thanked him and accepted the drink.
Nick always asked for no ice in his soft drinks. The sodas weren’t as cold, but the temperature of the beverages were not the issue. You see, at the time he worked for a fast food restaurant and the policy there was to put as much ice as possible in the cup to ensure that there was a bare minimum of actual soda, thus increasing profits. No one was going to pull that with him! Nick exists on this planet only to beat “The System”. To him, every monetary transaction is a business deal, even something as trivial as putting change in a parking meter. If he paid for one hour of parking, he would use the space for exactly one hour…even if it meant sitting in his car for fifteen minutes until the time ran out. By asking for no ice, he felt he was getting more for his money. But as it turned out he got a little more than he though he would.
So we sat in the darkened theatre drinking our flat, lukewarm sodas and watching the movie. Die Hard turned out to be a great action ride. About an hour into the film, with our drinks long gone, we both had the need to go to the bathroom. But the action on screen was heating up and moving like a non-stop roller-coaster ride that would not end until the final flickering of the film’s last frame. We couldn’t leave at that point. Not without missing something important.
“Nick, you fucking asshole,” I whispered to him, “I have to piss now.”
“Me too,” he said, “hold on, man, how long could this movie be?”
At the time the average action film ran between 90 and 100 minutes. Die Hard was over 2 hours long. We were able to hold on until the end without doing irreparable damage to our kidneys or bladder. The moment the credits began to roll, we were gone.
We rushed up the aisle and to the theatre’s washrooms, but the Alexis Nihon had 2 other cinemas, one show was a few minutes from starting, and the other ended about 5 minutes earlier. The men’s room had only 3 urinals and 2 stalls, and the lines were several people deep.
“Do you want to wait?” I asked Nick.
“Are you kidding?” he said, “let’s go. There’s got to be a washroom somewhere else!”
We ran out into the Alexis Nihon Plaza, but because it was Sunday, and at the time stores in Quebec were by law kept closed, the place was deserted. All the restaurants in the plaza were closed as well, cutting off access to their lavatories.
“Where do we go?”
“Wait,” said Nick, “there’s a MacDonald’s across the street! We’ll go there!”
At the corner of Ste Catherine and Atwater was what someone once told me was the first ever MacDonald’s in Canada. We had to run up the stairs (the escalators were, for whatever reason, not operating) and out the main entrance. At the time, the Alexis Nihon Plaza was undergoing some minor renovations, and most of its front was boarded up with construction barriers.
“I can’t hold it!” I shouted as we rushed out the main entrance, “I’m going behind the construction barrier!”
“No!” Nick shouted, “We can make it! Don’t pee on the street! There's always cops around here! You’ll get a ticket!”
We managed to get to the restaurant, and made a B-line for the washroom, which was located downstairs. He took the urinal, I took the stall. We must’ve peed for at least 2 minutes each. It was like turning on a fire hose. But we made it.
The Alexis Nihon Cinema is closed now, as is the MacDonald’s across the street. Stores in Quebec can now open on Sundays. Nick went on to see Die Hard two more times with two different dates. He refered to it as his “Summer of Die Hard”. The film went on to be a classic 80’s action flick (you can find it on my list of four-star movies) and its lead, Bruce Willis, became one of the biggest names in Hollywood (a lot I knew about talent).
To this day, whenever we’re in line at the movies, and Nick asks if I want anything before he goes to the candy counter, I say “No, thank you. Remember the 'Die Hard' Incident?”
It is at that point whomever we're with always asks: “What do you mean by The 'Die Hard' Incident?”
And the legend continues...
