SFTA Offers Movie Mondays Free Summer Movies Under the Stars in Costa Mesa: Easy Way to Meet New People
As a dating and relationship coach for women (and some smart men!) over 35, 40, and 50+, singles have been approaching me for courtship and relationship building advice and coaching since shortly after my late husband passed away because they saw the example of our marriage. Surely not perfect, just committed, joyful, and persevering. We weren’t looking, but apparently everyone else around us was watching us!
As a dating coach to midlife singles in their forties and fifties+, one of the greatest challenges the midlifers find is a difficulty in meeting quality singles around their own age. Once you are no longer 35 years old, suddenly the venues where you used to go to mix and mingle with your peer singles vaporizes like a dream.
It can literally feel like you were going to one after-work watering hole with colleagues one sports season, and the next time there’s a kickoff or a puck drop and the whole single social scene pulse is different. Who are all those different 20 something faces on the bench lineup? What happened to the late 30s and early 40s folks? Like Teemu Selanne at 43 years old retired from the NHL, once you’re in your early forties, if not before, the PUA pick up scene at the singles bars just got frigid to your age group.
You have to start developing a collection of venues which you can attend to meet and mingle with singles over 40 and 50 to feel comfortable, hot, and attractive. Stop being the chaperone!
A cool venue for the summer time in SoCal‘s Orange County, CA area is at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts. If you don’t live near Costa Mesa, that’s ok. Poke around near where you live and use this film program as some inspiration to guide you to options in your area!
Starting in the summer months, SCFTA is partnering with the Newport Beach Film Festival folks to screen a number of older movies with mainstream appeal from Shirley Temple to The Spice Girls. This series is dubbed “Movie Mondays” (use the hashtag #MMOC @ Twitter to find the tweetstream conversation.) The screenings will be done on the big side wall of the Segerstrom Center for the Arts facing the Leatherby’s Cafe Rouge restaurant entrance, in Costa Mesa, CA, across from the South Coast Plaza mall. The restaurant is offering a Movie Monday‘s theme to-go menu of boxed dinners you can purchase and order in advance.
Better still for mixing and mingling is to pack your own picnic dinner and have a finger food item you can offer to others for sampling and sharing. Alternatively, if you’re going last minute, there are drive thru fast food restaurants in the surrounding strip malls. Grab a value meal and beverage, and come on over! You can still make use of this outdoor free summer event to meet new people and extend your social circle.
The set up of the area begins at 5:30 pm with the movies starting at about 8:00 pm. The partnership with the Newport Beach Film Festival brings a handful of the best short animated films from this year’s film festival which will be screened before the evening’s feature film.
Now, if you’re already in a romantic couple, attending these screenings makes for a fun #DateNight with your honey. In which case, arrive whenever you feel like it.
However, if you’re one of the many singles reading this, then you want to take advantage of this event drawing so many people of various ages out into public where you are without your having to play hostess. For you, that means you want to arrive early!
Getting there while they are setting up means you can ask questions to get more familiar with the Movie Mondays program and any special logical details you might care to learn. Bring a nosh, nibble on it while you’re talking to them, and offer just anyone you’re talking to one of your homemade cookies. Don’t overly focus on talking with who looks single or anything like that. You really want to focus your efforts simply on mixing and mingling. Aim to be friendly and attractive.
In your picnic basket, remember also to bring along with you some kind of personal cooler. Pack plenty of ice because summer nights in The OC can still be pretty warm until the lovely breezes are kicking in. That also means, bring along a light cardigan, over shirt, or sweatshirt for when the air does get quite cool and the wind picks up which is apt to do in that open air plaza. In your personal cooler, pack a few bottles of lovely fresh water and maybe a few cans of a fruit juice or soda you like. You want to bring a few more than you will personally consume so that when you are casually chatting with the person next to you on your right and on your left, and you’re sipping your frosty cool can, you can graciously offer them a can of your soda.
What you want to do is go with the aim of simply meeting and interacting with a handful of new people. Most important to do is to break the ice. So often at these events, people attend and never speak to a single soul. Put down your table and power off your smart phone. An easy dating tactic is to come prepared with a few ice breaker sentences and a few ice breaker conversation movers. You want to say more than, “Nice movie,” and “Thank you.”
The more someone new interacts with you now, sharing a bit to eat of your cookies, maybe their french fries (even if they are not your favorite, accept a few of whatever the other offers so you keep things open and moving graciously between you two), giving them a can of soda, conversation, and memories about the films and the artists in the movies, the more natural and comfortable the segue is to asking them to join you for a cup of coffee afterwards or a little late night bissel of an ice cream sundae (Both of these are an option at McDonalds, down the road, most of the other restaurants are closed by 10 o’clock here and you don’t want conversation to be rushed. Just extend the evening now.)
Whether whoever you meet is someone you want to date or not, so long as you have a few things in common, such as an affection for old classic Hollywood movies, then aim to make them a good acquaintance or yours, someone you could invite to a group BBQ with friends or the ice cream social your club hosts each August.
Details to Note Before You Go:
The area for viewing is a wide open cement covered plaza. There is no seating. Viewers need to bring their own lawn chairs. No personal BBQing or Grilling will be permitted.
The Movie Mondays runs all the Monday nights in July and the first Monday night of August. Double check the SFTA event calendar for any possible last minute changes.
There is no charge for these events. You do not need a ticket to attend these summertime movie nights. The screenings are FREE!
The physical area of where the screenings are being held is wheelchair accessible and flat, also making it easy for anyone walking with a cane or walking assistance of any kind.
Happy Dating and Relationships,
April Braswell
Internet Dating and Relationship Expert
As seen in Dating for Dummies, 3rd Edition
April Braswell is an expert columnist at DatingAdvice.com and speaks to singles in Singles Groups and Divorce Support Groups as well as at Singles Dating Workshops and Singles Conferences. Looking to Hire April to speak at your Singles Event?
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