with the Wind, Mr. Mom.
My dad’s favorites:
Beverly Hills Cop, Star Wars, Zulu.
(Don’t ask.) Then, of course, there was our Christmas movie collection. Everything from
Christmas Vacation
to
Miracle on 34th
Street
(both the original and the newer one with that dude from
The Practice
and that woman from
Big
).
I slipped out the tape of
It’s a Wonderful Life
and popped it into the VCR, causing the screen to go blue right in the middle of the minigolf montage of
Overboard.
Grabbing up the remote as I backed into the couch once again, I started to feel a little bit better. I was taking control. I was being proactive. I was not going to let outside forces get me down. And I was not going to let my mind wander back to our night at the movies again just because
I
was
watching
a movie. No. This was the new me.
I picked up my cell phone just to make sure Sarah hadn’t called and the thing had neglected to ring (it happens!), then put it aside and hit the Play button on the remote.
I started to lie down again but stopped myself. No. I was going to sit up straight like a human being whose entire life had not been trashed less than twenty-four hours ago. I was going to watch my movie and cheer the hell up.
One hour later I was ready to put my bare foot through the television.
This
was supposed to be uplifting? What was wrong with Frank Capra, anyway? All poor Jimmy Stewart wanted to do was get out of his little nothing of a town and see the world! Why wouldn’t they let him
do
it? Couldn’t he just have gone on his little trip with his big monster trunk, come back, and
then
married Mary? And I have a hard time believing that a babe like Donna Reed ends up a lonely spinster librarian just because George Bailey doesn’t exist. Come on! Were the rest of the guys in town born without
eyes
or something?
This movie was so contrived! It was so false! It was clearly made just to snow the viewing public into believing that their tiny little coupon-cutting, lawn-mowing lives were something more than they actually were so that they would keep going back to their dead-end jobs making money for big business and stuffing the bank accounts of the wealthy—the people who actually knew better.
And for God’s sake, how the hell did Jimmy Stewart keep himself from strangling that annoying little Zuzu, anyway? I would’ve taken a shovel to her head somewhere in the middle of the first act.
I picked up the remote and flicked off the television in disgust. Maybe I would go to Blockbuster and rent
The Nightmare Before Christmas.
I’d always boycotted it on principle, but now I was kind of curious. Maybe Holly would let me borrow her copy.
Suddenly the front door opened and slammed and I sat up straight, startled. My eyes darted to the clock. It was only a little after three. My mother wasn’t supposed to be home for a couple of hours. I was about to get up and go into the kitchen when I heard the distinct sound of my mother weeping and I stopped, my heart seizing up. Like I said, my mother rarely lost it, so when she did, it was kind of a scary thing. A scary thing I wasn’t quite sure how to handle.
But my father, the one who knew exactly what to do in these situations, wasn’t available. It was going to have to be me.
I stood up shakily, letting the fleece blanket I’d wrapped around my legs fall to the ground, and tip-toed toward the kitchen, half hoping my mother would hear me and get ahold of herself. What was I supposed to do? I hated seeing my mother cry.
When I got to the kitchen, I hovered in the doorway for a moment. My mother had put a kettle of water on the stove and was pulling out the cocoa powder from above the microwave. She was wearing a knee-length skirt, a silk shirt, and heels, and she was all coiffed, just like she always was for work. Was there some problem with our insurance? Or was something wrong with Dad?
“Mom?” I said tentatively.
She dropped the measuring spoon into the cocoa can and turned around,
My dad’s favorites:
Beverly Hills Cop, Star Wars, Zulu.
(Don’t ask.) Then, of course, there was our Christmas movie collection. Everything from
Christmas Vacation
to
Miracle on 34th
Street
(both the original and the newer one with that dude from
The Practice
and that woman from
Big
).
I slipped out the tape of
It’s a Wonderful Life
and popped it into the VCR, causing the screen to go blue right in the middle of the minigolf montage of
Overboard.
Grabbing up the remote as I backed into the couch once again, I started to feel a little bit better. I was taking control. I was being proactive. I was not going to let outside forces get me down. And I was not going to let my mind wander back to our night at the movies again just because
I
was
watching
a movie. No. This was the new me.
I picked up my cell phone just to make sure Sarah hadn’t called and the thing had neglected to ring (it happens!), then put it aside and hit the Play button on the remote.
I started to lie down again but stopped myself. No. I was going to sit up straight like a human being whose entire life had not been trashed less than twenty-four hours ago. I was going to watch my movie and cheer the hell up.
One hour later I was ready to put my bare foot through the television.
This
was supposed to be uplifting? What was wrong with Frank Capra, anyway? All poor Jimmy Stewart wanted to do was get out of his little nothing of a town and see the world! Why wouldn’t they let him
do
it? Couldn’t he just have gone on his little trip with his big monster trunk, come back, and
then
married Mary? And I have a hard time believing that a babe like Donna Reed ends up a lonely spinster librarian just because George Bailey doesn’t exist. Come on! Were the rest of the guys in town born without
eyes
or something?
This movie was so contrived! It was so false! It was clearly made just to snow the viewing public into believing that their tiny little coupon-cutting, lawn-mowing lives were something more than they actually were so that they would keep going back to their dead-end jobs making money for big business and stuffing the bank accounts of the wealthy—the people who actually knew better.
And for God’s sake, how the hell did Jimmy Stewart keep himself from strangling that annoying little Zuzu, anyway? I would’ve taken a shovel to her head somewhere in the middle of the first act.
I picked up the remote and flicked off the television in disgust. Maybe I would go to Blockbuster and rent
The Nightmare Before Christmas.
I’d always boycotted it on principle, but now I was kind of curious. Maybe Holly would let me borrow her copy.
Suddenly the front door opened and slammed and I sat up straight, startled. My eyes darted to the clock. It was only a little after three. My mother wasn’t supposed to be home for a couple of hours. I was about to get up and go into the kitchen when I heard the distinct sound of my mother weeping and I stopped, my heart seizing up. Like I said, my mother rarely lost it, so when she did, it was kind of a scary thing. A scary thing I wasn’t quite sure how to handle.
But my father, the one who knew exactly what to do in these situations, wasn’t available. It was going to have to be me.
I stood up shakily, letting the fleece blanket I’d wrapped around my legs fall to the ground, and tip-toed toward the kitchen, half hoping my mother would hear me and get ahold of herself. What was I supposed to do? I hated seeing my mother cry.
When I got to the kitchen, I hovered in the doorway for a moment. My mother had put a kettle of water on the stove and was pulling out the cocoa powder from above the microwave. She was wearing a knee-length skirt, a silk shirt, and heels, and she was all coiffed, just like she always was for work. Was there some problem with our insurance? Or was something wrong with Dad?
“Mom?” I said tentatively.
She dropped the measuring spoon into the cocoa can and turned around,
Similar Books
