Life As A Movie

They’re making a movie about my life. Spielberg refused to direct because it is too dull. Ingmar Bergman turned it down saying it is too exciting. It’s not enough of a madcap-zany romp for Preston Sturgis and it is too real for Fellini. Woody Allen said he needs someone more nebbish. Stallone wanted me less nebbish.

Casting should be no problem. Peggy says I look just like Sam Waterston. And I always thought of myself as Cary Grant. I’ll settle for anyone except Danny De Vito.

It’s one of those movies in which the audience knows what’s going on before I do. In fact I’m the last one to see what is obvious. It must be hard to watch all my wrong turns and missed signals. I wouldn’t bother if I had just a cameo part or even second banana but in this one I’m the star.

What was he thinking when he did that?
No, no don’t fall for that!
If not now, when?
It’s about time.

There are no car chases though I did get ticketed once for almost coming to a full stop. Now I get out and look for trains at every intersection. No near-death experiences unless you count the time I hung on the line waiting for customer service at Verizon while the person I wanted was away from her desk. There are some exciting moments such as the time a woman at Costco let me in line in front of her with my one item or less. For those who insist upon a little violence their Adrenaline may get moving when I use excessive force separating two shopping carts in a parking lot. This was managed in one take without a stuntman.

Cineastes have learned the language of movie maladies; how a headache is never less than a brain tumor and a cough means certain death from T.B. within twenty minutes unless a Viennese doctor is sent for with an experimental treatment. The other scene that never happens in my film is the plan to leave (for anywhere) first thing in the morning, shorthand for an untimely demise. My getaway gets me away.

After I scale the wall, dodging searchlights and the hounds, I make my way out of the Valley past the last row of repeatable homes. Just in time, I was almost too over the hill to go over the hill. At this point I'm hearing background music, a cross between Hi Ho Silver and Swing Low Sweet Chariot.

There are also scenes of the No Problemo Bordello in Pocatello in which I lost my shirt but not my pants. And two hold-ups at gun point for Dilaudid between globes of colored water, followed by the ignominy of picking the wrong man from a police line-up.

The rest is arguably the Second Greatest Story Ever Told, which answers the question: Can a mild-mannered pharmacist from suburbia find happiness with a bohemian poet, living in a rent-controlled garret, who hung with Orson Welles, Krishnamurti, the Modernaires and Carl Jung? The answer is, Yes, ever after and the camera is still rolling.