Drive In

The drive-in off to the right as you head north on the 101 between San Jose and San Francisco is old and dirty white. I have never seen a movie there yet I remember it fondly. Driving by at seventy and slicing around slow Bay Area drivers, I never saw much of it but drive-blurred images especially the one time I think I glimpsed a movie playing on the screen made me think of television fed scenes—hot rods, teenage girls, and fumbling in backseats. A time before mine but one that seemed as T.V. wanted it to be—simpler, happier. It also reminded me of the one time I ever went to a drive-in.

My parents had a brown Buick Century station wagon. We had driven across country in that thing. The far back seat faced the rear of the car. My brother and I would sit there with a bright orange cooler crammed full of soft drinks and snacks. We gorged on pixie sticks and other super-sugared treats which when mixed with Coke would create a sticky concoction that begged to be licked off your fingers. The summer heat baked the car but that did not matter. This was the seventies. The all-American car had an all-American air conditioner tantamount to a muscle car’s engine. Full blast with recirculation on meant that the far back was a refrigerator and my brother and I needed a blanket to stay warm.

That station wagon was the host for my one drive-in experience. I must have been around five because I know we went to see All The President’s Men. We included my mother, brother, father, his cousin, his cousin’s wife, I think my cousin, and the orange cooler.

Even at five one thing dawned on me. It is quite hard to watch a drive-in movie from the back seat of a car. Being small I could move down just a little and see a fair amount of the screen; how the rest fared I have no idea. Well, almost no idea.

I remember a semblance of a speaker with some knobs with which my dad and uncle continually fiddled as if they somehow, as a doctor and an engineer, could lay hands and improve the technology within its black plastic shell. And then there was the cooler filled with beer, sandwiches, cheeses, and Cokes waiting to be devoured. No; wait. That was someone else’s cooler. Our cooler was filled with chutney sandwiches, butter and cheese sandwiches, samosas, chat (an Indian snack of mixed fried stuff), and the one thing of common culture, Coke.

Given that only those in the front seat could really see the film and that the sound quality meant no one could really hear it, food became the focus of the evening.

So, over the back seat flipped my brother and I. It began with “Ah beta, get the chutney sandwiches.” As we pawed through the cooler in the dark and handed the wrong food to people someone figured out that in the far back it was even darker than in the middle seat where the light from the screen barely reached. What to do? The people needed their food.

My mom remembered that on her keychain she had a small ladybug flashlight, a cheap made-in-China device with low-grade plastic painted in flat red and black. When you squeezed the insect’s back a tiny not even half watt bulb came on. It cast what passed for light and the curved rubber back made it hard to keep that small light on for more than a few seconds. Still, armed with the light the food was found and passed out which led to stage two.

“You should have some. Eat.” “No. I don’t want any.” “Eat silly boy. It is chutney.” “Leave him be. He is an American boy. What would he know of chutney?”

Now a word about chutney. There are tons of chutneys: mango, lime, pickle, banana, tomato, sweet, hot. The term simply means a relish. The chutney in question was in fact a cilantro based chutney. Today I happen to enjoy the stuff as a dipping sauce for kebabs or as part of this one chicken dish I love, but as far as a five year old boy could tell, it was liquefied lawn clippings. Slathering it on a piece of white bread and slapping another piece on top only made for soggy pieces of bread separated by lawn clippings, nothing more. Whether a kid raised in India would find such a sandwich appetizing I have no idea but I doubt it.

As it was my brother and I had popcorn which we ate in between the Indian drive-in dance—eat, comment on food, ask for more snacks, have the kids search for the snacks, and start over.

The ritual was not hot rods, teenage girls, fumbling in backseats, but it was still in front of an old, dirty white screen that life was simpler, happier, and perhaps better put carefree.

An American Gift
By Deven R. Desai

I know two truths about baseball: I’m not a fan and every American ought, and I do mean ought, to go to the ballpark with someone they love. I realized this second point while some radio guys bemoaned the state of baseball as too slow, scandalized, and in general decline. They pondered the effects of video games and extreme sports on the teen market and wondered how holding last season’s first games in Japan helped baseball’s image in the good ole U.S.A. They got me there. Then again I came to appreciate baseball in Scotland where I learned to love that other sport with a ball and bat, cricket.

I was twelve when I grew to love cricket. It should not have stood a chance. Like many kids today, the slowness of baseball and trying to follow a team for such a long season turned me off. Yet cricket’s pace with its breaks for lunch and afternoon tea that makes baseball look like a Lakers Celtics game during showtime never hindered my ability to love it. I don’t, however, follow a team. I don’t know the leagues’ or teams’ names. I don’t even know how often cricket is played. I’m an American. I only know and love cricket because during the summer when I was twelve my grandfather taught me the game.

My parents were making one of their last stabs at keeping their marriage together and shipped my brother and me off to relatives in Scotland. I had rarely seen my grandfather let alone bonded with him until we watched an international cricket test match together. After that we watched game after game all summer and my grandfather slowly, patiently taught me the subtleties of this long, drawn out game—what a silly wicket is, how a googly works, and defensive batting. The pauses and slower moments created a small, magic space where my grandfather and I could share something as he explained the game and told stories of previous glory. Just like baseball.

Baseball is that steady, shared connection that grows and bonds novices and experts, fans and players, fans and teams. Baseball is a day in the park filled with sun, hot dogs, and Cokes. Baseball is time—time to ask a question and have it answered before the next play, to think about what might happen next without just acting, to slow our lives down and connect with friends and family. Baseball is a gift.
I may not be a fan but I love baseball as a great American gift. And I know that all Americans ought to go to the ballpark to unwrap their present and like all great gifts they should share it with someone they love.