Who gets kicked out of a movie theater for eating popcorn too loud?

Have you ever eaten popcorn so loud that you got kicked out of the theater for it? Well, probably not, and I haven’t either. Heh, the movie’s probably too loud to hear tiny popcorn bits mashing against your teeth, and all the staff are all the way at the very back of the room, so they couldn’t hear it anyway. But once, in a game, I had to make people think I was in fact kicked out for that very reason! And to do so, I had to share it as a story and pretend it actually happened. A story created and crafted just right! 

You see, I was in my high school’s creative writing club, sitting together in a small group. We were basically playing two truths and a lie, but with a twist—true and false stories about your own life. If you told a true story, you had to tell it in a way that convinced everyone it was just a fictional narrative. On the other hand, if you told a fictional story, you had to tell it in a way that convinced everyone that it was a true story, one that actually happened in your life. Everybody listening would most likely be aware that the storyteller is trying to convince you otherwise about the story. Everyone seemed to be looking closely for the sublest hints and dead giveaways. Tension was in the air. There was no preparation either—we had to do it on the fly. We had to randomly pull a prompt off a deck of cards, come up with a story the best we can, and then tell everyone. 

I received a prompt to make up a story about my friend getting kicked out of the movie theater for EATING POPCORN TOO LOUD!! No way?! It’s so ridiculous! I never even dreamed of something so ridiculous being possible yet, let alone in a serious situation where it would actually happen! At first, I was like, “That’s such an absurd scenario, how would you make it sound realistic?” Man, seriously? How was I supposed to do that? Nonetheless, I tried my hand at it anyway.

Well? Believe it or not, one person was actually convinced! But the other guy somehow wasn’t. 

Oh dear… was he unconvinced by my story? It’s so absurd! I mean, who would believe someone being kicked out for such a trivial reason?

Wrong. 

Actually, he said the reason he didn’t believe the story was real was because I was laughing while I said it! It was such an absurd scenario that I just couldn’t help but crack up while I told the story. He didn’t even mention the fact that the story was absurd or anything about popcorn or getting kicked out from the movies. This means maybe, just maybe, if I didn’t laugh, he would have been convinced!

But how could the absurd idea of someone being kicked out of the movies just for eating popcorn too loud be turned into an entire story? What is this “secret” (that actually is not a secret and has been around since humanity existed and time began!) that made my story so convincing? I’m going to break down why I think my story convinced them. Stay tuned for more.

Well, there’s a story behind everything. You probably have seen some seemingly absurd things in your life. All those have stories behind them. The same goes for people we don’t understand or find difficult. 

So I thought about it as if it were a serious story. I did what kind of I do while working on short stories and my novel series (in progress), The Redemption of Invynceth. Sure, I know what happened. I supposedly got kicked out for throwing popcorn in people’s fac–er, I mean eating popcorn too loud! But what really happened? What were people thinking and feeling? What were they intending on doing? What did they desire, and what was at stake here? What is the story here? 

You know, as I’m thinking about writing this very blog post, I’m actually thinking about what story I should frame it as here! Because I actually don’t exactly remember everything that well that happened that day. If you don’t exactly remember it, what was the story then? What’s the story here?

It’d be nice if I could just say something dramatic like “I was struggling so much to come up with the popcorn story. This moment suddenly took me back to the time when my father reached out after years of no contact, and said he forgave me for what I had done. That was the first time I saw my mother in years as well, and that was the first time I was with her too. So I knew exactly how to write this story… it I knew that it perfectly paralleled me sticking with my friend even though everyone else wanted to kick him out…” 

The thing is, stories often aren’t so simple or come in such dramatic moments. They are there, but are often much subtler. They’re found in all kinds of thoughts and moments. Whether the intense ones or the relaxed ones. Including the ones we overlook. Even the smallest ones. And yet, they reflect the evolution of something far greater. And those thoughts and moments accumulate over time and evolve more and more…

TO BE CONTINUED