Q is for...Quest

Do you remember any New Year’s Eves when you toasted the old year by saying, “Man! I am sooo glad that one is over!” ?

My worst year?  1999.  No doubt about it, that was the worst year on so many levels.  My 44 year old brother Bill died Dec. 12, 1999.  His death took my breath, my heart, and my sense of balance away from me. 

When we toasted the new Millennium, I was choked with tears, and wished I could have somehow saved Bill with the knowledge I now possessed.

Still, it was the holidays.  As a large group, we and my husband’s family went to see “Galaxy Quest”, just recently released.  The theatre darkened, and the popcorn & soda were going fast.

Suddenly, I was taken out of my blackness into this alien world with Tim Allen, Alan Rickman, Tony Shalhoub, Sam Rockwell, and Sigourney Weaver.  Their lives as actors on a defunct TV show, “Galaxy Quest”, had not gone well since its cancellation in 1968 or something.  They made their living by hitting SciFi conventions and even attending ribbon-cutting ceremonies at dinky electronics stores.

Faithful fans like Justin Long believed in the reality of the Galaxy Quest world. 

In the dark theatre, I laughed until tears ran down my face.  Strange how laughter and crying are so close in their physical resemblances.  But, I laughed, rolling in laughter.

Q is for…Quest, Galaxy Quest.  For me, the brave crew and I made a quantum leap together that day.

Sources used for this post:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GalaxyQuestCast.JPG

http://1linereview.blogspot.com/2011/03/galaxy-quest-1999.html 

K is for ... Kids

A lovely restored downtown

Somehow the 1950s of my childhood seemed to be a sweeter time, almost innocent.  The cars were big and roomy, without seatbelts.  Keys were often left in the ignition, in case the car had to be moved out of the way for a tractor.  Children could be left in the car; no one would take them.  Everyone would watch the car anyway, to make sure the kids stayed there.

A different town in a different state in the 1950s

Perhaps leaving kids in the car wasn’t a good idea all the time.  Maybe some wisdom should have been applied.  I don’t know.  But the story here is a true story, with details changed because it is a good idea to change some things.

 Lenora had four kids, and was expecting a fifth any day.  She had a list of errands to accomplish before #5 came:  stop by the butcher and pick up the five gallon sealed container of newly rendered lard, go to the bank, and then drop off the newly-collected honey to be put in jars at her sister’s house.  So far she had completed only the first one—picking up the lard.

1956 Ford Fairlane

Lenora left the keys in the car and told the boys what she would do to them if whatever.  Then she went into the bank for just a few minutes.  A few dang minutes.

A five-gallon tin of lard, pure snowy white

When Lenora came out, she shrieked and shrieked.  “What the________ have you boys DONE?” 

A last ditch effort to advertise lard

The entire interior of the car was plastered, no, layered, with handprints of white lard.  Coated from ceiling to floor mats, from rear view mirror to the back window in lard, thick greasy lard.

Then the honey had come out from the sealed jar and dumped in great sticky strands over the lard.

The doors were locked.  The kids were not talking or responding, just giving a quiet giggle now and then.  The keys were in the ignition.

Lenora sat down on the curbing and cried.  What else could she do?

Z is for...

ZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz….

Back in 1983, my husband John and I went on “Date Night” to see a movie, called “Terms of Endearment”.  Not knowing much about the film except its strong acting cast, we thought it would be excellent.  Which it was, of course; it won best film, best actress, best supporting actress, and maybe best director. 

Shirley MacLaine plays a strong-willed, vain mother whose daughter, played by Debra Winger, develops cancer.  Ms. MacLaine is helped through this horrific experience by her neighbor, played by Jack Nicholson.  Mr. Nicholson plays a former astronaut, who is thrown into helping this family during this heart-wrenching time.  Jeff Daniels plays Debra's unfaithful, but likable husband.

Heart-wrenching, sobbing-tears, and nose-blowing.  That is what half the theater was doing during the entire movie, once Ms. Winger’s character goes into the hospital.  Oh, I was probably the noisiest and most prolific when it came to the sobbing and blowing.  All my tissue, which was an ample supply, disappeared into a sodden mess in the empty popcorn container. 

Half the theater, did I say?  Yes, all the women in the theater were crying buckets of tears.  The men?  A few of them had moist eyes, discreetly wiped; my husband was one of them.

During the biggest scene of all, when Ms. Winger’s character is in the last moments of breathing, and silence reigned in the dark theater, there was a sound.  It cut through the air like a buzz-saw in a timbered forest.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…snort, snark, and hiss…zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

The source of the sound was behind me, and I turned to see a man in his 50s.  He was completely asleep, head thrown back, mouth open, and arms crossed.  The buzz-saw sound was erupting from his slack mouth.  His wife saw me watching him, along with every woman in a twenty foot radius.  She gave him an elbowing that must have bruised straight to the ribs.  He jumped up, saying, “What?  What?  Where?”

As Ms. MacLaine welcomed the grandchildren into her home, and we were supposed to be prostrate on the movie floor, sobbing with grief among sticky popcorn, we instead were busting with laughter. 

I guess every tragedy needs some comedy.
A big THANKS goes to the A-Z Blog Team!  Check out the link below:
http://tossingitout.blogspot.com