My grandpa Lloyd loved movies.
I mentioned in another story that years later he caught us coming out of a movie we weren’t supposed to be seeing.
Apparently, Grandpa had been spending plenty of time in movie theaters long before we came along.
In 1945, Grandpa Lloyd G. Hardy was twenty years old and serving in the U.S. Army.
Movies were a regular part of Army life by then. The Army had its own motion picture service distributing Hollywood films to servicemen, and new releases made their way through military camps and bases.
I don’t know what movie Grandpa and the other soldiers were watching that particular day.
Given the year, I like to imagine it might have been Along Came Jones, a Gary Cooper Western that came out in the summer of 1945.
It seems like something Grandpa would have liked.
But the movie isn’t really the part of the story that survived.
Grandpa was sitting in a crowded mess hall with the rest of his company watching the movie.
At some point during the show, Grandpa farted.
Not the kind that announces itself.
The other kind.
Silent.
And apparently devastating.
Grandpa didn’t move.
He didn’t laugh.
He didn’t look around.
He just sat there watching the movie.
And waited.
Slowly, the smell began working its way through the packed room.
The soldiers around him started noticing.
Grandpa still didn’t move.
He gave it another minute.
Then, when enough time had passed for there to be absolutely no way of knowing where it had originated, Grandpa suddenly jumped out of his chair.
He spun around and pointed directly at the completely innocent private sitting behind him.
“Pee-yew!”
The poor guy had no idea what was happening.
Suddenly an entire section of the mess hall was looking at him.
He slouched down in his chair, apparently hoping the attention would go away.
It didn’t.
Eventually, completely embarrassed by something he hadn’t even done, the guy got up and left the room.
Grandpa stayed.
He had a movie to finish.
I never heard this story from Grandpa.
Dad told it to me.
And that’s probably why I’ve remembered it all these years.
It’s easy to preserve the important things about someone’s life.
Dates.
Birthplaces.
Marriage.
Military service.
Children.
Jobs.
Those things get written down.
But they don’t necessarily tell you what someone was like.
I don’t know where Grandpa was stationed when this happened. I don’t know the name of the private sitting behind him. I don’t even know what movie they were watching.
But I know Grandpa.
And the part that makes Dad’s story completely believable isn’t that Grandpa farted in a crowded room.
It’s that he waited.
If this resonated with you, you’re not alone.
