You’d a thought we’d be tired. Indeed, the humidity was incredibly high yesterday and we’d spent most of the day outside. Some of us trudged up and down Seventh Avenue for the street fair, some of us went to see the Red Bull Air Races in New Jersey.

We came home hot and sweaty. Some of us took naps, some of us just stood next to the air conditioner and drank cold lemonade. You’d a thought we’d be toast by the time we ate dinner. You’d a thought we’d be ready for bed. But then someone—I think it was Hepcat— made the suggestion.

And then I googled it to find out if it  was within the range of possibility.

And then my daughter said she’d like to go because she was, like, 2-years-old, when Toy Story 2 came out and she sat with me and her brother in Cobble Hill Cinema.

“It’s playing at 10:05 at the Pavilion,” I said aloud from my computer.

“Let’s go,” OSFO said.

“Let’s call Eastern,” Hepcat said and dialed the car service as I paid for tickets online.

Waiting for the car service downstairs I wondered if I’d make make it through the movie. The night was still warm and I felt like if I closed my eyes I might fall asleep. I looked at my watch and suddenly felt completely irresponsible. It was 9:50 and we were taking our 13-year-old to a 10:05 movie on a school night.

“This is kind of crazy,” I told OSFO as we got into the car.

The next thing we knew we were being transported to the Pavilion on Prospect Park West but then had to turn around because I forgot my wallet on the dining room table. Hepcat ran upstairs, the car service driver was pretty good-natured about the round trip and a half, we drove back up to the Pavilion and reminisced about 1 & 2.

“Well, you weren’t even born when the first one came out. I remember seeing it with Teen Spirit in Manhattan,” I said. “And the second one. You were just 2-years-old…”

And then I realized that going to see Toy Story 3 at 10pm on a Sunday night the weekend it opened made sense. The first two were markers in our lives, memories of wonderful movies we’d first seen in movie theaters and then lived with over the years on video and DVD.

I cried with my son when Jesse reminisces about her first owner, Emily, and Sarah Mclaughlin sings “When Somebody Loves You.”

It became a family joke. The second or third time we saw the movie in a theater my son would look my way during that sequence to see if I was crying. Yup.

There’s something about these films that delight and touch me deeply.