Life’s Rich Pageantry
O, the pageantry. Nothing gets me more than the first notes of song at life’s auspicious beginnings. Turn to me as the lights go down in any theater, and when the overture starts, you’ll find my eyes spilling over with anticipatory tears. The Oscar telecast. The National Anthem before a game. My niece’s piano recital. It’s such a strange, involuntary, sentimental impulse, like someone has reached inside my heart’s memory and pulled up the most pure, childlike excitement through my throat and my nose and eyes. It literally takes my breath away sometimes if I think about it too much, and then the tears can turn into embarrassing, unruly sobs – a total inappropriate mismatch for the significance of the event. I mean, the Olympics are exciting, but it’s not like I have some special connection to them. No matter—I’ll be glued to the tube next Friday night during the Opening Ceremony. Hell, I’d tune in for the opening of an envelope, if they played a soaring John Williams theme song. (N.B. For a good cry, play any song in the John Williams oeuvre.)
On occasion, there’s a legit reason for my waterworks. Like, my wedding, for example, when the obvious life-changing circumstance (not to mention the first few notes of “Prince of Denmark’s Waltz”) provoked immediate tears.
Or when I was on the Today Show. Actually, it was the lesser Weekend Today Show, but it had the same music cue (thanks again, in part, to John Williams) to do the trick. Having grown up watching the show (and having continued to watch it, despite the fact that I’m clearly not in their target demographic, and I hate Kathie Lee Gifford), I was very excited when my Dad and I were invited to be interviewed as part of the promotion for our book, The Art of Friendship: 70 Simple Rules for Making Meaningful Connections. That morning, I was fixing my hair in the mirror when I heard the violin music kicking off the show’s broadcast on the TV in the other room. Let’s just say I had to redo my make-up before heading off to the set and our interview with Lester Holt. See? Even the lameness of Lester Holt on a Saturday morning, and I was swept up in the excitement as if it were Matt and Meredith on a Monday.
Movies on the big screen do it for me, too. This week, we took a field trip from Nantucket to the big city of Boston to see “X-Files 2: I Want to Believe.” Though not a former fan of the TV series, I did have a vested interest in seeing the movie (and, potentially, getting choked up about it), because my Dad has a cameo appearance in it, around minute 40. (A diligent personal promoter, my Dad had “hinted” enough times to enough people in the film business that he would “make a great butler, judge, or bit actor” that one of them — Chris Carter, the “X-Files” director — finally bit. Carter graciously wrote the part of “Elderly Gent” into this latest movie sequel, replete with a page of dialogue and a full scene to perform with Mulder and the others. The chilly Vancouver shoot was the highlight of my Dad’s year.) Well, wouldn’t you know, when the lights went down in Theater 9 of the AMC Loews Boston Common 19, I couldn’t help but get a little teary with the thought that I was going to see MY DAD in celluloid. His “Elderly Gent” performance merited every emotion – but by the time he appeared, I just stared in dry-eyed wonder. He was great!
After Dad’s movie, we were off to watch the Red Sox play the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Seeing Fenway Park for the first time – with the “Green Monstah” and that bastion of baseball history — was truly one of “life’s rich pageants.” But after the requisite hot dog concessing, by the time we found our seats, the first inning was well underway. Thankfully, we missed the National Anthem.
One can only take so much pageantry in one day.
