A CHILDHOOD ESSAY
A Chance Encounter with an Actor Brought Me and My Grandma Closer Two Years Before Her Death
While watching The Green Mile in the theaters, we saw actor Graham Greene…who was in The Green Mile
When I was 12 years old, my grandmother took me to see the film The Green Mile in theaters. In hindsight, watching a film that categorically spotlights life for inmates on death row may not have been the best choice for a Grade 6 kid to see. But, my grandma — affectionately designated as Nanny — and I were exceptionally close and one of the many things we bonded over was film. At the time that we saw The Green Mile, Nanny and I were already as thick as thieves, but a chance encounter that day brought us even closer together. What made it even more surreal, little did we know, was that Nanny would succumb to cancer nearly two years later to the day.
Shortly before the winter break, Nanny came to visit, so we went to see The Green Mile at the small-ish theater in our local shopping mall, which could seat no more than 40 people. As soon as we walked in, we took notice of how quiet it was for a Saturday, with merely ten people or so in the audience. How bland, I thought, considering the film had just been released.
