We headed off to Ithaca this afternoon to see a movie, Letters from Iwo Jima, just one of many movies we can’t find here. It was cold and icy walking the streets, but a nostalgic setting for us. Many winter Saturdays in the 60’s, Dad and I would be dropped off in Ithaca for a date at the movies - I remember Love Story, James Bond, The Graduate - Dad remembers more. There were four theaters then, only the State remains now, and it doesn’t do movies anymore.
Being in Ithaca with the family was always a day’s outing - Home Dairy for lunch, the stationary store, below street level, where I chose the paper I would write love letters on, the jewelry store where I bought Dad’s wedding ring, the shoe store on the corner where they would actually measure your foot and help you try on shoes, the bookstore where I bought Lois Wise poetry, the department store where I bought a blue checked winter coat on layaway while I was in high school. Around the corner is the clerk’s office where we applied for our marriage license.

The Commons were not there. It was just a street with traffic, and the excitement of a city, and especially pretty in the snow. When we were young, not yet married, I always imagined us living there,  shopping there, walking the streets together there - and so whenever we return for a day, I feel we are back home.