At (Long, Long) Last

I can't remember the last time I watched TV before noon.

Except for that exercise show when I'm making my daughter's bag lunch in the morning, just before "Curious George." Sometimes it helps to have a TV in the kitchen. Not that I exercise at such an ungodly hour, it just wakes me up to watch somebody else do it.

I like CG much better than that imbecile Calliou, who was cancelled a few months back, thank the gods at PBS. The voiceover of Calliou's wise and understanding grandmother at said ungodly hour made me want to heave a cereal bowl at the screen. Of course I refrained, being a role model for my daughter. The exercise show features a rather meaty broad who favors Seventies Top 40 and looks like she belongs behind the bar at some roadhouse in Green Bay.

Of course all this is moot because the television in the kitchen is on the blink. It hasn't blinked since the bailout. And no, I didn't heave a cereal bowl at it, it succumbed one morning of natural causes. I don't even know if the meaty broad is still on, or CG for that matter. I'm feeling meaty myself lately, time to get back on the old GI ball. Does anybody say that any more? My mother used to.

The last time I watched TV before noon might've been the first Clinton inauguration. We were living in the woods, on the river, I was trying to disappear. If you're trying to disappear, the woods is your ticket. Also, a river helps. Whatever you do, if you're trying to disappear, do not become a parent. Apparently I was naive. What parent isn't? By the time reality hits you between the kidneys, it's too late. You're cooking mac&cheese forty-seven times a week and Curious George has replaced George Clooney in your wet dreams.

I can't remember the last time I had a wet dream.

I do remember sitting meatily on the red carpet in our bedroom in the woods, watching Bill take the oath, feeling mightily good about it. Talk about naive. Still, it felt like a step in the right direction. Like, into the future, stupid. I'd give anything if once, just once, someone would use that epithet on that idiot Calliou. For instance his grandmother, who no doubt knows how stupid he is, having done the play-by-play on his every move lo these past few years, not to mention her shame at his head being the size and shape of a beach ball.

It's 2 p.m. and I just checked in again. They're leaving the luncheon in Statuary Hall, heading for the parade route. It'll take them awhile to get there. I may miss the denouement, their arrival at their new digs. With any luck they'll be there for the next eight years.

I can't remember the last time I felt lucky.

We lived in the woods for eight years, exactly, long enough to take root. But apparently we were spruce, not jackpine, our root systems shallow and widespread. We toppled over at the first big wind and blew back into town. So much for the disappearing act.

I'm having trouble believing he's going to disappear, that it's finally over. I watched him get on that helicopter this morning, but it felt like maybe, just maybe, this was actually some cruel new experiment in virtual reality. Or maybe some morning soap I wasn't aware of, not being a before-noon TV person. Mostly I'm an order-every-season-of-Six-Feet-Under-and-a-case-of-Pinot-Grigio-and-hang-a-Don't-Fuck-With-Me!-sign-on-the-bedroom-door kind of TV person.

I wanted to heave a cereal bowl at the helicopter but I refrained, largely because I wasn't in the kitchen. Sometimes it helps to have a TV in the bedroom.

Like now. It's evening. I took a short commercial break to do my life, and I'm back on the tube. The singer is singing her heart out -- that old Etta James tune -- and they're dancing. It's making me want to dance. Sometimes you just have to dance. Sometimes you just have to reappear. Sometimes you just have to wake up and turn on the TV to realize you're not dreaming.

Sometimes nightmares end.

Who needs an exercise show? I can't remember the last time I felt this awake.