{Live} My Date With Ryan Gosling
October 3, 2011 in All Posts, Parenting
Last week, Hubby and I had what you might call a spat of sorts.
To make a long, uninteresting story shorter and more interesting, words were slung around like gloppy fingerpaint in frenzied toddler fists, which fortunately turned out to be the washable kind, and came clean in a day or so with some gentle scrubbing.
I had the brilliant idea of a date night to smooth things over, but before I could surprise him, Hubby aggravatingly beat me to it, by texting me to ask the babysitter if she was available on Saturday night. She was. And Hubby texted a few minutes afterwards that he had booked tickets for “Drive.”
My first reaction - if only for a split second - was, “a movie?!”
Don’t you even want to do something where we actually talk and spend time with each other?!
* * *
Five minutes before the start of date night, after I had gotten all gussied up in six inch platforms and a full smoky-eye (yes, for the movies — this was Date Night after all: a night that comes around only twice a year when the moon is full and there’s galactic alignment), Hubby came into the bathroom and asked, “Well, should we have dinner instead? Would that be better than watching a movie?”
I squinted my heavy black fringed eyes and haughtily chastised him that a movie wasn’t what I thought would be a good use of the precious few hours we had for our biannual Date Night. A movie, where we wouldn’t speak or even look at each other, defeats the purpose of Date Night when we already spend zero time together.
Hubby sought to appease me and sincerely offered, “Whatever you want to do we’ll do.” I casually replied, “No, the movie is great. Let’s go.”
Little did he know that during my righteous indictment of his Date Night choice, I left out the part that my initial wave of anger when I first received his text about the movie was quickly quelled by the prospect of 100 uninterrupted minutes of a blown up Ryan Gosling gracing the screen in front of me.
Actually, the idea of satisfying my latest Hollywood fantasy crush - by sitting alone in the dark with Ryan - and killing the date night stone at the same time - by sitting alone in the dark with Ryan - seemed like the best possible win-win.
* * *
Over the days leading up to Date Night, I had been getting more and more excited for the movie, and really couldn’t think of anything else I’d rather do with my free time, even if it was precious free time with Hubby that I suppose I ought to have wanted to cherish alone with him and his undivided attention.
So, when Hubby then asked, “Should we see Moneyball instead? I heard that got better reviews,” I immediately stopped him, “No! No! Drive will be great. Ryan Gosling and cars. What else could be better?”
(That got Hubby. He’s a huge fan of both. Besides, I’m so over Brad Pitt (even though Jane has just discovered him).
And I was so right!
Drive was the best movie I have ever seen. Well, at least one of the best. And definitely the best I have seen in a very long time. Not just because it was Ryan Gosling, but because it was Ryan Gosling - an insanely great actor with unbelievable charisma. In Drive, he plays a nameless, mostly silent, Hollywood stunt driver/mechanic by day and getaway driver by night who gets involved with his sweet married neighbor, her son, and her ex-con husband in what I can only think to describe as a retro, art house, reference-laden, suspenseful and campy gory thriller that takes you on the most thrilling emotional and visual ride. The slow pace and 80’s-inspired synth-pop soundtrack had my heart racing every second.
Turned out that Hubby absolutely loved it, too, and we were so amped up about analyzing and dissecting the screenplay, actors and soundtrack afterwards, that it fueled the rest of our 52 minutes of precious Date Night alone time before heading home to the babysitter. Getting our heads outside of the doldrums that is our normal daily routine by experiencing Drive’s fun fantasy together got us excited about everything else we had to discuss that night . . . like our bills and our garage remodel. (Sadly) I’m not joking.
The moral of this story: all you need to put the spark back in your marriage is a date night with Ryan Gosling. (He’s my boyfriend, but I’ll let you borrow him).
If politics, not cars, will lure your husband to your date with Ryan, then go see Ides of March, which opens next week!
Image via The Week (crediting Filmdistrict).
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Chrissy – who has written 422 posts on The Outlaw Mom® Blog - Creative Living in a Conventional World.
[…] to comb the racks for something cute to wear this weekend on my first date night with Hubby since this one nearly 8 months ago, I kept getting sucked back into the makeup department where we started. I […]
Date Night is really important. We don’t get around to that enough here. I’m glad it went well for you. It’s always fun to get away from the house and such. The trailer for Ides of March looked good.
I’m looking forward to seeing Ides of March, but since we’ve just gone on a Date Night, I’m sure we’ll be Netflix’ing it months from now
Hope you are able to get out and see it in the theater!
Glad it went so well!!! I’m trying to make date night a priority, too… My crush is the guy that plays Thor. OMG. My daughter hasn’t discovered Brad yet but she likes Justin Bieber.
Okay, this is how sad I am: the only thing I could think of when you said Thor was 1987′s Adventures In Babysitting (starring Elisabeth Shue), with Vincent D’Onofrio as Thor. (Don’t worry, I google’d it and found the right reference!).
OMG. I have better taste in men than that. Hahahahahahaha! The new THOR is scrumptious.
I’ll have to check
ithim out!