From the moment my parents took me to see Bambi when I was about four years old, I’ve been a cinephile. There have been so many phases to my cinema going – with Daddy and/or my cousin Sean, every Tuesday evening with my cousin Colette and her friends when I was still a pre-teen, and then, once I got to university, spending every penny of spare change I had on going to the movies. I’d go with friends and I’d go on my own. Lots of my friends spent their spare money on Silk Cut cigarettes; I spent mine on Kevin Costner.

In my third year of my undergraduate degree, I had a two hour cartography class at 10am every Friday. There were two problems with that. First, found the class boring and, second, midway between my house and the Maynooth Geography department was the bus stop for the number 66 bus into Dublin.

I attended the first few classes of the first term but, as the weeks wore on, I found myself more and more often stepping into the bus if it happened to be there as I walked past. On those days when I got on the bus rather than going to my cartography class, I would arrive in Dublin in time to fit in three films throughout the day. I can’t remember the names of the cinemas or if they’re there any more, but there was one on either side of O’Connell Street and another over on the end of D’Olier Street. Sometimes I’d spend all day in one cinema, other days I’d flit from one to the other and back again, grabbing a cheap sandwich in between. I went to see everything, apart from horror; some films I saw multiple times, even going out at the end of one showing to buy a ticket and go straight back in to the next.

Soon I was hopping on the number 66 bus every Friday morning, not thinking twice about the class I was missing or the assignments I was supposed to be completing and submitting every week.

One week, the bus wasn’t there, so I carried on to the Geography department and into my class. I sat amongst my friends and the class began. About 20 minutes in, there was a knock on the door and Professor John Sweeney asked if he could see me. I got up and went out with him. (My friend Niamh told me later that she thought I was being called out because I was going to get some award for my excellence in geography!! One thing I’ve always loved about Niamh is her blind faith in me!!)

I followed Professor Sweeney up to his office and he sat me down. He seemed very concerned about me. ‘How are you?’ he asked. When I told him I was great, he asked how was my family, how was my health, how were things at home. To all his questions, I told him everything was great. I had no idea where he was going with this.

‘We have students who start out poorly in this cartography course and then drop out. And we have those who start out well, but then their assignment grades drop and then they drop out. But you,’ he said. ‘You started out with good grades and then suddenly stopped submitting your assignments. So I’m worried that something is wrong.’

A smile broke out on my face. Relief. And told him the truth. About my love of cinema. About the timing of the number 66. About how I spent my Fridays. About finding the cartography class a bit boring. My honesty disarmed him or caught him off guard. He was probably relieved that he didn’t have a student in crisis situation on his hands. Whatever it was, he gave me another shot.

Monday was a bank holiday, so he gave me until Tuesday at 10am to submit the seven assignments I’d missed. I returned to class. I spent the next three days catching up (admittedly with a major dollop of help from Niamh’s, Paula’s, Sinead’s and Fionnuala’s assignments) and handed them in on Tuesday morning. I didn’t miss a Friday morning cartography class for the rest of the year.

I thought about all of this at 10:30 this morning when Katie suggested we race into Leamington to catch the 11:10am showing of Jurassic World Rebirth. I sat in the dark at the cinema, my eyes wide, excitement mounting as the trailers rolled. I looked over at Katie, and thought ‘That’s my girl.’