One night many months ago, I was re-telling the story of the Tri-county pie-eating contest to Katelyn & Allison. Most people probably remember it from Stephen Kings’s Stand By Me– the barforama scene was both funny and gross to me when I watched it 20+ years ago. I had to rename the character from “Lard Ass” to “Fat Art” to do away with a “bad” word. Anyway, I grossed out the girls but they enjoyed how Fat Art got his revenge and got back at the people who were cruel to him. I told them that the story was from a movie.
So earlier this week, I caught Stand By Me on cable at the train scene which is just right before the barforama scene. So I called the girls from their room to watch the scene with me. I figured it’d be cool to make good on my promise of letting them see that part of the movie. When it was done, they thought it was pretty gross with all the barfing but they also thought it was funny too. As I turned off the TV and asked Allison:
Rex: “Did you like it?”
Allison: “It’s funny Daddy!”
Allison was impressed: “But how do you know these things?”
Rex: “You mean the story? Daddy watched the movie a long time ago. But I remember the story because it’s one of Daddy’s favorite movies!”
Allison: “Oh… I like it too Daddy!”
I think she was impressed that the story was “real” and that her old dad didn’t make up it all up… 🙂