Dot got a bunch of new movies as gifts on Mother’s Day from her daughter, and she asked me if we could watch one of them yesterday.  I read through the titles for her, and she chose “The Help”.

She asked Joe if he wanted to watch it with us, but he was fully reclined in his chair (all we could see were the bottoms of his feet) and sound asleep, so it seemed as though he didn’t care.  This was the first time that I had ever attempted to watch a movie with Joe and Dot, and it turned out to be a less than enjoyable experience.

First of all, Dot is completely deaf in her left ear, so I had to pause the movie every fifteen minutes in order to shout at her about what was happening.  Joe is not nearly as hard of hearing as his wife, so he would practically jump out of his recliner every time I gave my running commentary of the movie.  When George came flying out of his chair, he opted to add his own thoughts throughout the movie as well.  The entire event can be summed up like this:

Me (shouting):  “The curly-haired girl wants to write a book from the perspective of the maids.  This is during the Civil Rights movement and it’s based in Mississippi…”

Dot:  “So the white girl is writing about the black women…?”

Me:  “Yes.”

Joe:  THUD THUMP THUD (the sound of his recliner closing down) “Oh God…”

Me:  “The mean red-headed lady is trying to get all of her friends to build separate bathrooms for their maids.”

Joe:  THUD THUMP THUD “What the Hell is all this…?”

Me:  “The red-headed lady fired her maid because she used their toilet.”

Joe:  THUD THUMP THUD “Oh Hell, this again?!”

Me:  “The maid got back at her by making a chocolate pie and getting her to eat it.  Turns out, she put poop in it…”

Dot:  “That’s disgusting!”

Joe:  THUD THUMP THUD “What’s so disgusting, Dorothy?”

Dot:  “Never mind Joe, we’re talking about the movie…”

Joe:  “What movie?”

Dot:  “The Help.”

Joe:  “Oh…is that the one you’ve been watching here?  With all the black people?”

Me:  “Yes.  It’s about the Civil Rights movement.”

Joe:  “Is that right?  Oh I remember all that…  Portland was a scary place back then.  A scary, scary place…”

Dot:  “Oh, it was not Joe.”

Joe:  “Oh yes it was.  We were outnumbered…”

Dot:  “Just never mind Joe.  (Looking back at me) – So what happened after she ate the pie…?

Joe:  “What pie?”

Dot:  “The one lady ate pie with poop in it…”

Joe:  “Well what the hell did she do that for?”

Dot:  “The black maid…she put poop in the pie to get back at the white lady…”

Joe:  (Laughing) “Is that right?!  Well that’s one way to make a point I guess…”

THUD THUMP THUD – and we were back to looking at the bottoms of Joe’s feet again…