The Dark Knight Rises...and so will we

I've always had this irrational fear at the movies of something bad happening.  I never really knew why, maybe because I started going to the movies without my parents at a time when it seemed like I wasn't allowed to do anything without adult supervision. So to be trusted enough to be dropped off at a location and sit in a dark room full of strangers for a couple of hours was both liberating and felt the smallest bit dangerous.

I have had a recurring nightmare since I was 8 or so about a gunman, or gunmen, entering the theater and terrorizing people. In this nightmare, I always try to find a way to escape, and it always ends with myself playing dead. It has always disturbed me how often this dream occurs, enough times that when AMC revealed their "loveseat" style seating years ago, my first thought was not how comfy it would be on a date, but rather the fact that it would make for a better hiding spot than seats that fold up.

Disturbing as these nightmares could be, I always chalked them up to my overactive imagination. Until yesterday.

I have been a midnight movie goer for years, the last being for "The Hunger Games" earlier this year.  I had contemplated it for "The Amazing Spider-Man" or "The Dark Knight Rises" but decided against it because a. I'm getting older, as are my friends, and convincing people to be up till 3 in the morning is not so easy to do these days and b. as excited as I was to see these movies, I wanted to be able to get lost in them, to pay total attention to the action on screen, instead of worrying about falling asleep. Never in my decision to go or not to go to a midnight showing was a fear for my safety while watching the movie. Maybe a little for the drive home afterwards, but never while inside the theater. Until yesterday.

People who know me, know me as the movie girl, the one they are always surprised if they have seen something I haven't.  That is because not only do I see a lot of movies, I see a lot in theaters, including on opening weekend. I'm not timid to go alone, I'm a bit of a snob and require certain rules at a theater, the biggest being no talking during the movie.  I like to be as far removed from my surroundings and as much inside the movie as possible. Latecomers, texters, even the light saber wanded theater employees irk me.

A lot of things bother me about what happened in Aurora; the fact that so many innocent lives were taken for no apparent reason is for sure the most upsetting and incomprehensible. It is blinding, life halting, sob inducing to think about. I have tried to think about other things but it has not been easy; it feels too close. The victims are my peers, people who love movies as much as I do, who don't find it ridiculous to wait online with prepurchased tickets for 5 hours to pack into a theater with no air conditioning to watch something others will wait months to catch on DVD.

However, the link that has really floored me is that the shooter was, on paper anyway, also a peer.  A student that worked in the building next to mine and lived across the street from campus. Someone that I may have come across in passing everyday without knowing. Someone who is now causing dogs to sniff around my workplace "just in case" rooms full of innocent strangers and neighbors and law enforcement officers were not enough potential bloodshed.

With any kind of tragedy the biggest question asked is always "why?' It is the question that always occurs, despite the fact that there is no correct answer. No answer will make this okay. No answer will justify what has been done.

Because of this I will try not to focus on the one to blame. I will try to focus on those that never left that movie theater, the ones at my work that never anticipated being there, lying in hospital beds trying to heal physical wounds, and the ones that made it out trying to heal the emotional ones.

We will all have to get used to a new world at the movies.  A world where purses are searched, fellow movie goers are scrutinized, and wanded theater employees are frequent visitors.

I hate that I was scared to go to the movie theater today. I hate that I was more aware of my surroundings than what was happening on the screen.  I hate the idea that I may have seen my last midnight show ever.  Most of all, I hate that my life no longer feels safe in one of my most cherished places. But I will not let this one person take away my joy and neither should you.

When I was in my first car accident as a teenager, my mom made me drive the same day. And then the day after that and the day after that. She did not want one bad experience to define me, to cause me so much fear that I would no longer enjoy something I once loved. She was also one of the first people I know to get on a plane after September 11th and encouraged me to do the same.  It is hard to imagine all I would have missed out on if  I let fear take over.  I will do the same for this.  I will continue to go to the theater. I will continue to get lost in a world outside of this one.  Will it ever be like before? No. But I recently saw a quote that seems appropriate: "Reality is something you rise above." We will all rise above this.  We will be okay.