It’s summer-time! There are many fun things to do in the summer (readers from New Zealand and Australia, just pretend you are in sunny California!).

Beach trips, amusement parks, vacations, and Hollywood always puts out lots of summer movies. You can look forward to a nice air-conditioned theater on a hot day. It can be a Friday night or Saturday night or even a midweek matinee.

( Unless you live in a small town like West Cliff Colorado, there the Jones Theater only shows Fridays and Saturdays).

You can escape the heat and have a couple’s activity in a nice cool place. This can be a time to indulge in some treats you might not otherwise allow yourself. Popcorn, hot dogs, nachos, soda and candy. If you just don’t enjoy these types of goodies grab water and a healthy snack. It’s always fun to snack and sip while you’re watching a movie.

Please take some time selecting the movie you want to see. If your relationship is new, looking up reviews and watching trailers can be a fun way to learn some things about what your partner likes. It’s also a great time to have open communication. Picking the movie together can be fun.

This is the reason it’s so important to check out the movie before you see it; you know how fun excited and upbeat you feel when you are walking up to the theater, you’re together, with your date, holding hands, you feel good. Well, Hollywood has a knack for telling stories so well that you feel them. That’s great, but if the story is a sad story, do you want to leave the theater feeling sad? If it’s a depressing story, do you want to leave the theater feeling depressed? If it’s a story about abuse, betrayal, violence… well you get the idea. You want to feel just as good and upbeat when you leave the theater as when you went in. If Hollywood could figure that out they would sell a lot more movie tickets. (Maybe it’s time for us to demand movies that make us feel good!) It’s up to you to choose, so make a good choice.

So check out the movies that are playing, pick one that you think is appropriate, say to your partner or your date ”let’s go on a movie date, I think you’ll like this one”.

Or, perhaps decide when you will go on your movie date and then spend some time together checking out reviews and trailers…

Hey guys, if it ends up being a ” chick flick” and you’re not really excited about seeing the movie, you can be excited about being the perfect escort. Just be with your partner. Next time you can choose the movie. Keep in mind how you want to feel after the movie!

There is a lot involved in choosing the movie isn’t there? One more thing to consider if this is a first date or early in your dating, be very careful with movies that have graphic sex scenes. That can be very uncomfortable. In her mind she may be thinking ”is this what he expects?”

In his mind there is nothing, he just squirms and looks the other way. Like I said, it can be very uncomfortable choose wisely

After your ”movie date” write in to How To Keep Love to tell us what you saw, how you liked it and how you felt after the movie. This way we can help other couples pick good, fun and entertaining movies!

Happy 4th July Everyone!