Saturday Night Live
I grew up watching Saturday Night Live with my dearest friend, considered my soul sister, Therese Reynolds. Therese lived five doors down from my family's home and she was the same age as my older brother Nino. Even though we were fourteen years apart from each other, we were friends as well as sisters of the heart. My parents owned and operated an Italian restaurant in Bixby Knolls, Long Beach and the weekends were late nights for them. Therese and her husband Dave were super kind about having me over on weekends, especially on Saturday nights so I would not have to spend every single night at the restaurant. They were both huge fans of SNL so needless to say I grew up watching Gilda Radner, Bill Murray, Jane Curtin, Chevy Chase, and Dan Aykroyd.
Sadly Therese passed away too early. Just one of those truly unfortunate aspects of life that no one really prepares you. Fortunately I am in contact with her two daughters and I'm blessed to get to talk to them from time to time. Blessed because the girls truly have so much of Therese in them that it feels like a hug from my friend with I talk with them. One of her daughter's posted on Facebook a link form SNL December 15, 2018 with Matt Damon and Cealy Strong called "Best Christmas Ever." It was truly hysterical to me! My comment was "LMAO" to be exact. The couple of this SNL is reminiscing their holiday while enjoying a glass of wine together. All seems unbelievably perfect! The wife even comments in the beginning about still having to do dishes, but the husband has already done the dishes. Just uber friendly, perfect, and cheerful. Then from there it goes from them sitting and relaxing to flashbacks of their day, the children, relatives, the preparation to the holiday etc. The truth revealed! Hectic times like you can probably imagine if you are a parent. All the while the scene goes back to them sitting quietly and joyfully in their living room talking about their perfect Christmas.
I liked this for two reasons. Firstly because the flashbacks show the realities of their stressful preparation and actual day. Facebook and other social media platforms are platforms for people to only show everyone perfection whether true or not. Secondly because it is an important reminder that we as the human race need to feel our emotions and let our feelings out! My father was born and raised in Italy and he never had issue with letting us know how he felt or was feeling. Especially if he was upset with us for waking them too early! We actually got yelled at. I think it worked. I grew up respectful of other people sleeping thanks to my dad. I think expressing feelings is actually healthy. Yet, too often we are in this numb stage of life wanting everything to feel and be perfect when it is not. Therefore not saying how we really feel.
Well true to all SNL's style and incredible play on life, this reality check of "Best Christmas Ever" is mixed with hysterical humor and truth! I hope you will find the humor in it too. At least hopefully you will get a chuckle out of it as well.
