I’m yet to see my last movie at the Sierra

My wife didn’t understand. How could she?

It seems like every time we talk about a movie from some point in our upbringing — be it “Back to the Future” or “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” or “Christmas Vacation” or “Batman Returns” or “Jurassic Park” or “Forrest Gump” — I always proudly announce that, “I saw that in the theater.”

“Did you?” I then ask.

“We didn’t go to many movies,” is her stock reply when I look at her with utter dismay.

It’s seriously possible that Amish kids on their Rumspringa have seen more movies theatrically than my wife did during her entire life growing up in Sioux City, a mere mile or two from a movie theater with 11 more screens  than my Sierra Theatre in Jefferson.

So how could she have understood when my parents announced this past summer that they were making the 10-hour, 662-mile car trip from Jefferson to our then-home in Springfield, Ohio, just to take our young son to see Disney’s “Planes” in a theater?

I got it.

My wife, on the other hand, just thought they were nuts.

Now we’re back permanently in Jefferson — and what my folks paid for in gas this summer just to see “Planes” with their grandson will now be able to buy his way into a couple dozen more movies at the Sierra.

In fact, we hadn’t even been moved back one whole week recently when they asked if they could take him to see the movie uptown.

I got it.

My wife got it, too, although I secretly think she just wanted a rare night of silence.

Growing up in Jefferson, I easily spent more time at the Sierra than at school, church and any other local institution combined.

I literally grew up there.

I remember sitting on my mom’s lap during “Superman II.”

I remember renting — nerves rattling — some late ’70s movie called “Cheerleaders Wild Weekend” with my friends during high school for a New Year’s Eve party.

I also remember us being royally bummed that the cheerleaders weren’t actually that wild, and that the cheerleader pictured on the cover of the VHS box wasn’t even in the movie.

What a rip.

Ultimately, though, I treasure all the time I spent at the Sierra — the hours spent during summer vacation reading the backs of the VHS boxes or snatching “Fritz the Cat” off the top shelf for a closer look when I knew that Lois Jean Brant, the longtime manager, was preoccupied.

I came home from college on break and immersed myself in the likes of “Fantasia” and films starring the Marx Brothers and W.C. Fields.

If I liked a first-run movie in the theater, it was always affordable enough for me to see again.

And, I didn’t have much else to do, so when the picture inexplicably flipped upside down during “Star Trek VI,” rendering it unwatchable, I just shrugged and came back the next night.

My dad can recall the last movie he ever saw — a Halloween showing of “Son of Frankenstein” in the early ’60s — at his hometown movie theater in Dunlap before it closed forever.

One of the great things about moving back to Jefferson is that I don’t have to talk about the Sierra in the past tense.

I’m yet to see my last movie at the Sierra — and that’s a marvelous feeling.

Besides, I don’t think I could claim anything nearly as cool as “Son of Frankenstein,” with Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, as my “last movie.”

Just the opposite, though, the Sierra, now under the care of the community, seems primed for another golden age.

A juried film festival for Iowa residents slated for the Sierra from Jan. 25-26 would have been unthinkable during my formative years.

Film submissions, by the way, are due Sunday.

My one and only regret is that I never got to work at the Sierra.

Back in ninth grade, when I decided it was time to go out and get a part-time job for some expendable cash, I could dream of no other place but the Sierra.

That afternoon, as I made my way toward the now-defunct rental area, where I knew Lois would be, I grew more and more nervous.
I was so nervous, in fact, I forgot to make a proper introduction.

Instead, I leaned in on the counter — always a good first impression — and asked, “Ya got any jobs?”

“No,” Lois answered.

“OK,” I said, making a quick exit.

Later on, I’m told she mentioned my awkward quest for employment to a friend, who already was working at the Sierra.

“That O’Mara kid was in here today,” she reported, “and he was looking for a job.”