Deck the Hallmark Channel

Fa la la la la, la la la, blah.

     I’m all about festive movie viewing for the holiday season. Classics like It’s A Wonderful Life and A Christmas Carol are a holiday staple in my home, as well as new classics like Chevy Chase’s Christmas Vacation and Bill Murray’s Scrooged. They should be watched in small doses, sprinkled sparingly throughout the holiday viewing season like treasured sweets. Instead, the Hallmark Channel's force fed film feast has me running for the Pepto Bismol. Every movie my wife watches on the Hallmark Channel's 30 Days of Christmas Marathon is driving me out of my mind (and out of my living room). There’s only so much Christmas magic I can take.

     These uplifting holiday made-for-TV movies are overflowing with 1980’s celebrities hoping to recapture some of their lost limelight (or at least pick up a paycheck). Over the past few weeks I’ve seen Crystal Bernard from the TV series Wings, Dean Cain from Lois & Clark and the omnipresent Candace Cameron of Full House fame. These long lost souls have been welcomed back into my living room for the holidays like homeless people with no place to go.The movie plots are another story. The titles say it all: The Christmas Secret, An Old-Fashioned Christmas, A Christmas Visitor, Merry Ex-Mas, A Royal Christmas, A Boyfriend For Christmas – and the list goes on.I’ve been inspired by these films to submit an original movie script of my own for next season entitled “Happy Holly Days”. Here’s a synopsis:

     Los Angeles advertising executive Holly Davis, who never experienced Christmas as a child, takes a job in Alaska to take her mind off the depressing holiday season. Thanks to a magical encounter with a Christmas angel while she’s picking out her Christmas Tree, she meets her second grade boyfriend, Brent, who is now the owner of a small company on the brink of collapse because an off-shore oil drilling contract is forcing his business to close. Holly rallies the quirky Alaskan townsfolk to band together to stop the pipeline and save her boyfriend’s business. During the victory celebration, Holly's boyfriend Brent is revealed to be the son of Saint Nicholas. He will become the next Santa Claus only if he marries his one true love, who just happens to be Holly. Fade to a white wedding winter wonderland in the North Pole where Holly and Brent live happily ever after, and Holly now has the kind of Christmas she’s always wanted. Fade into a long shot of Brent and Holly flying in a magical sleigh lifted up to the sky by magical reindeer. Zoom in as they kiss in silhouette against the bright full moon in the dark winter sky. Fade to black.

    Unfortunately, after reading my outline, my wife noted this movie has already been made. The plots of these cookie-cutter movies all blend into one another.  I can’t keep the stories straight.

     Me: “Why is Candice Cameron in an ice-fishing hut with a lumberjack? I thought she was engaged to the singing cowboy.”

     My Wife: “That's a different movie. This is Christmas Under Wraps.”

     Me: “Does Alan Thicke play her rich father?”

     My Wife: “No, that was Let It Snow. Stop asking questions.”

     Me: “I need more spiked egg nog.”

In the midst of all this artificial holiday cheer, one blatantly bad movie shines through the darkness like the North Star – “Grumpy Cat’s Worst Christmas Ever.” It even has “Worst” in the title. Talk about truth in advertising. In the words of Ebenezer Scrooge, “Bah, Hallmark!”

Age before beauty

That Seventies Show

     The tell-tale signs of aging are making themselves known to me, but I choose to ignore them (or maybe I just can’t see them through my tri-focal glasses. Now, where did I put them?).

     For a long time, I was the guy who looked eternally young. A virtual Portrait of Dorian Gray. Maybe it was my red hair or my youthful exuberance. “You’re how old? No way. You can’t be. You look so young.” Yeah, I used to get that a lot. 

     In my younger days when I ordered something in a drinking establishment I was routinely asked for my ID by waiters and waitresses young enough to be my children. I remember celebrating my sixth wedding anniversary with friends at the Spinnaker Lounge in Cambridge. The waitress singled me out saying, “I only need to see your driver’s license. Everyone else is obviously of age.” I was equally embarrassed and flattered. Yeah, that hasn’t happened to me in a long time. A very long time.

Recently, I was in the passenger seat as my wife bought coffee for us at a Dunkin’ Donuts drive-thru window. My wife noticed the total on the cash register was different than the amount the cashier asked for when she handed us our coffee. 

     “Oh, that’s because of the senior citizen discount for the gentlemen,” the cashier said cheerfully. 

My wife gave me a sideways smile. I was equally embarrassed and perturbed. I didn’t dare ask what the age is for that particular discount. I wanted to toss a quarter inside the drive up window and say,      “Keep your discount, you young whippersnapper!” I kept my hurt feelings in check as the sudden realization of my escalating age sunk in.

     This year my wife and I celebrated our 34th wedding anniversary. We were out for dinner with the same couple we’ve celebrated with every year, who share the same anniversary date with us. I wasn’t carded at the table when we ordered drinks. I felt my age as the young waitress enunciated the nightly dinner specials to us as if everyone at our table was hard of hearing. The four of us craned our necks as we strained to hear what the waitress was saying. We tried to read her lips as we looked at her quizzically. We declined ordering any of the specials because A.) we couldn’t understand what she said, and B.) we couldn’t remember what she said. To be fair, the background noise in the restaurant was fairly loud. And there was a draft coming in from the front door And none of us brought our shawls. 

     I’m going to ignore the signs of aging as long as I can. You’re as young as you feel. I think of that every time my knee joint pops and I pop and an Advil to numb the pain. I still identify with being a redhead even though my hair is gray (white? silver? I don't recognize the color anymore. Chalk it up to failing vision).

     I got some advice on aging from my mother who turned 89 years old this year. She’s still going strong – cooking, cleaning, doing laundry and shopping. She keeps up on current events, reads lots of newspapers and is a superfan of The Big Bang Theory sit-com. She told me age is part of the evolution of life. It creeps up on you slowly when you're not looking. I’m starting to realize how true this is as I gulp down another handful of Ibuprofen, secretly wishing to return to the days when I had red hair and I was being asked to show my driver's license when ordering an alcoholic beverage. I’ll take that embarrassment over the senior citizen discount any day.