More on my wife (I will call her Bet, not her real name).

I met my wife in middle school, or I should say I knew of here but did not really hang out with her. She was considered sort of “brainy” and dressed very modestly. While I was bright enough, I more than made up/down for this with my laziness. She consistently got good grades on all of her classes and I only did well in science and math, which I had a knack for, and spent almost no time working on.

We live in a medium size town in CA, USA and there were about 12 public schools and a couple of high schools. This was before the era of private schools being the norm and everybody went to the public schools. In this situation, once a kid was in your school, they were always in your school unless that family moved away.

Although our schools wasn’t that big, I only had a peripheral knowledge of Bet as she was not the type you would ever meet up with for a beer party down by the river. In fact, I never ran in to her at parties and never heard of anyone partying with her on the weekend. Beer parties were our main form of entertainment, by the way.

The first time I had Bet in any of my classes curiously enough was in grade ten English. English was not my thing but we had to take it. Bet was not a very vocal person, did not talk much in class, and had only a couple of close friends I ever saw her with. The only thing that stood out in my mind was when we were studying some film crap; at least that’s what I thought of it. Our teacher made some mention of an older film related to the one we were studying. I can’t even remember what the films were, but I think the previous film was an old obscure black and white one from the 30’s or 40’s. At some point Bet blurted out, “you‘re wrong” which surprised all of us. Unlike, the teachers of today who sometimes claim they “liked to be challenged”, back in the early 70’s, the last thing a teacher would tolerate was being challenged.

The teacher kept his cool and with an air of superiority explained to Bet, in front of the whole class, that her outburst was inappropriate, and that as she was still very young could couldn’t appreciate the way the two films were related. The teacher thought he had put Bet “in her place” and looked very pleased. Full of himself, he asked her if she “could now start to appreciate the relationship between the two films”. She remained mute, although her brow seemed tensed up as though she realized she may have “crossed the line” with this teacher. The teacher, sensing a minor victory over a young girl, asked if she “had anything more to say”, as if hoping to swat her down again.

I can honestly say, I hated almost every English period I had to endure my whole school experience except that one. What happen next was almost as much fun as the best beer party I had been to.

Bet asked the teacher if he “really wanted her answer”, while maintaining a look of calm defiance on her face. This was not the Bet that any of us had experienced. He asserted his superiority and asked her for the “Bet interpretation of films” in a slightly mocking tone.

He had no idea of what he had started. There were only about 15 minutes left in the class, but the exchange that followed went on for a good twenty five minutes and not one student got up to go to the next period, even after the bell had rung.

Bet, outlined to the teacher, that although the two films had some superficial similarity, they were not really related at all. She informed the “superior ass” (my words, certainly not hers) teaching our class that he had entirely missed the point of the older film and the more than obvious social comments being put forth by the director. She outlined that role of the characters in the two films, although matching roughly in apparent powers of authority and submissiveness, were reversed and clearly the director of the older film was demonstrating the wealthy character was the victim and his social standing kept him a sort of captive.

Bet then went on further to explain how the point was further made by the camera work and the choice of camera angles and editing used by the two directors. She pointed out, that in the later movie, the one we had seen and been studying, the director had many choices of how to shoot certain scenes, and that it was clear by the way they were shot and edited, that the message in the first film and the second film were totally different.

The teacher, sensing he was losing his superiority, then claimed two or three other old films he named supported his point and that Bet did not understand his point in totality. Clearly the only mis-understanding was on the part of the teacher as to who was in front of him that day.

Although we lived in California we were nowhere near the movie business and had no notable celebrities in our town. It was like the Bet in that class that day was from somewhere else.

Following the teacher’s latest assertion, Bet looked at him coldly for about fifteen seconds as if wondering whether to proceed or not. He then showed a little smirk on his face and that was it. Bet then took each film the teacher had mentioned, one by one, outlined the plot as most would interpret it, and then pulled it apart to reveal the hidden layers that most would not considered. She spoke of the camera work, how the lighting complimented the themes, mentioned a few obvious editing errors and managed to refute almost every point the teacher made.

Bet than amazed everyone by saying to the teacher that he was absolutely right on one score. She “did not understand his point in totality” or for that matter, “very much of it at all – sir”. She then admitted “there were a lot of things in this world she did not know about, but apparently she was not alone – sir”.

She then got up and walked out of the class, past the students for the next period crowded at the door, and off to her math class for which she and the rest of us were late.

The following day in English film study was over we started reading “As you Like It”. We barely heard a peep from Bet after that and although I was in her math and science classes later I was never in an English class with her again. I never witnessed an outburst from her again and never was really aware of her much in high school after that.

I had no idea were Bet lived at the time or anything about her. Following high school I joined the army and stayed in for about 8 years. I didn’t see any action but managed to get some pretty good training on radios and communication equipment. Following the army I moved back in with my parents while I figured out what to do.

I saw Bet next at the grocery store when I was picking some stuff for my Mom. She looked a lot prettier than I had remembered, probably because I had never thought about her in that way before. She said she was living with her Aunt still, and having never other knowledge I assumed she had always lived with her Aunt. She told me her parents had died in an auto accident a long time ago.

I saw her again about three weeks later and inquired if she was married. In fact she was single and worked at some small aerospace contract company doing something with mathematical modeling. While I had been in the army she had gotten a graduate degree in mathematics, specializing in something I later found out to be modeling laminar flow. She has since explained to me what this is and I can discuss it but, at the time, it could have been quantum physics for all I know.

I got the impression she was really single, not just un-married, took a chance and asked her out. We dated for about two years over which time I inquired about the outburst in the English class long ago. Each time I asked she sort of dismissed it saying my recollection of the incident was greatly inflated and that she simply made a few points. However, I believe my recollection of the incident was quite clear.

I asked her to marry me. She said yes on the condition that we move further north. Her Aunt was selling her house and she said she was thinking of applying to a company where some of her ex-colleges worked and that I could easily get work in the new place.

Nine months later we were married and moved about an hour north. She had her Aunt and a couple of friends from public school at the wedding and there were about 47 from my side of the family. We often went to movies over the years, mainly at her request, but oddly enough, she never really wanted to discus the films.

We’ve been married for 31 years and this brings me a bit closer to the present.
………………………

I explained how my wife tolerated my minor collection of erotic movies but did not think much of their quality, and my challenge for her to find better stuff. She never watched the material with me.

Well she has ordered me a few movies/films, and while they are not the type with a deep plot they are well shot and sort of enticing. The consist mainly of single women performing for the camera, but un-like the meat grinders of today, the women seem to thoroughly enjoy what they are doing.

I must say I was dumbfounded at my “math loving” wife’s ability to pick these out.

Little did I realize that I had in fact fallen into the same trap as that English teacher back in grade ten. I assumed I knew more about these erotic movies than I did, and when it came to Bet, even after all this time, I had no idea what lay beneath the cover of this particular book.
It was after my wife had bought me about five or six films (on DVD) that I ran into Steve, who I had gone to high school with. We caught up for a while I mentioned that I had married Bet after I got out of the army. He looked at me and said “still waters run deep”. I asked him what he was talking about and he could tell I was clueless. He asked if I was busy, and when I said no he asked me back to his place.

Unbeknownst to me, Steve had married one of Bet’s few friends after I had married Bet. I followed Steve back to his place and he cracked open some beers his for wife Katie himself and I. I remembered Katie from my wedding but did not really talk to her much that day. Steve told Katie to tell me about Bet, but she declined and said, “that’s her business”. Well Steve started the story knowing full well Katie would correct him when he got it wrong. After about two hours and four beers each I got the jist of it.

Bet had not always lived wit her Aunt. Throughout all of public school she lived with her parents and little brother in what passed for our “downtown” above a theater. Her father had been some minor actor or director or something in Hollywood in the fifties but as his career was taking off something transpired and no one would hire him any more. Apparently he had many friends in the business but for some reason they could not really help him out. Eventually, an old mentor of his, who owned a string of small town theaters and arcades, set up Bet’s father to manage our local movie house and a couple of seedy arcades.

Here’s where things really got interesting. Bet’s father ran both of the theaters in the downtown, which most people had assumed were in competition. His wife managed one while he worked the other. The mother’s was a straightforward theater showing mainstream releases. The father’s theater, which was smaller, showed Hollywood type movies on the weekend and, shall we say pornographic fare during the weeknights Monday to Thursday, when things were slow. This was a bit of a surprise.

Both Bet and her little brother, along with the parents would clean the Theaters in the mornings before school and Bet had the job of changing the loop films in the adult portion of the arcade while they were closed on Sunday mornings. During the week the machines that broke down were left idle and she and her father would fix and maintain them on Sundays. While most people at the time would consider this an inappropriate job for a young girl it appears that her parents treated her more as a young adult, perhaps out of necessity.

Her father still longed for the film business and a few times Bet had told Katie it was possible they were going to move away if her dad got a job working at a film school.

It was her father that had imparted Bet with an encyclopedic knowledge of film from a young age. The basements of both theaters were packed with old movies that were no longer shown as they were out of fashion. Whereas most kids of her age would watch Disney movies on TV on Saturday afternoon, Bet and her father would watch large screen 35mm movies after the last showings when the patrons had left. The father would continually discuss these movies with Bet as they played. This was sort of like a director’s commentary you would get on a DVD today.

Katie had watched a few of these after hour’s movies with Bet and her father until Katie’s parents found out. Her parents had known Bet’s dad ran porno movies in his theater and wanted Katie to stay away from the theaters. Katie didn’t understand at the time, as all she had ever been shown were old classics.

Bet’s mother hated the theater business and everything to do with it and complained constantly. She is the one who kept at Bet to study hard so she wouldn’t end up doing a crummy job and cleaning up other people’s messes. To her, running a theater was ten percent running movies and ninety percent cleaning up. Bet’s maternal grandfather had been a small town doctor but had died relatively young and leaving Bet’s mother with memory of what stable middleclass life could be like.

In any event it appears that Bet’s mother’s encouragement paid off. Although Bet was working at the theaters and arcade, while most of us spent our weekend’s having beer parties, she spent the remainder of her time preparing herself. Her mother was determined the kids would have a better life than she and her husband had ended up with.

Tragically, Bet’s parents and little brother were killed in and auto accident sometime after high school when she was in college. Her father was driving to an interview for a job at a film school. I guess they got lured out of town by a teaching job, but not the way they had expected.

It was after her family’s death that Bet had discussed her upbringing with Katie, including the parts considered less savory by most people. By this point Bet had moved in with her single Aunt who bought a small house in the same town as her sister, Bet’s mother.

Bet had told Katie that, while cleaning the adult part of the arcade was gross, she noticed that popular perception of what people wanted was not always correct. She explained to Katie that while the arcade had peep booth film machines with hardcore smut, it was the machines with slightly older women smiling and having fun in front of the camera, usually black and white films, that seemed to require the most maintenance. These films had rather mild activity and were certainly very tame by today’s standards. As she was responsible for changing out the films in the loop machines, so the customers would not get tired of the same stuff, she invariably would find a few notes jammed in the corners of the machines asking for loop #587 or loop 24D. This almost never happened with the hardcore material.

Bet had also told Katie that her dad had faced all sort of trouble from the good “moral” people of the town who tried to stop the adult material from being shown. The theater business was marginal at best and it was only by threatening to shut down both theaters, if pushed, that they managed to stave off the pack. Apparently a small town with a Monday to Thursday adult theater is better than a town losing two theaters.

In conclusion, it was with this background that I finally understood what had happened back in that English class in grade ten. I also understood why Bet had hesitated in defending herself to the teacher lest her family life become the topic of discussion. As it turned out, Bet went to our school, which was outside of her area, because her mother wanted this. It was probably also the fact that she had to start working very young, while the rest of us were having a good time, which made her mature enough to challenge the English teacher that day in class. Neither the teacher nor any of her classmates knew what was inside that neatly dressed studious young girl who was to become my wife.

I never mentioned the conversation with Katie and Steve to Bet although we get together a few times every year.

I figure, just stay quiet and let my wife pick some more erotic material for me. She knows what I like better than I do. Eventually she’ll come across this post if any of the readers figure out her real name and let her know.