I was in my early teens when Julie Andrews became inexplicably linked with cranberry sauce for me. My family—mom, dad, sister and I—were paying a Turkey Day visit to my grandparents in Sun City, Ariz. They’d moved out there not too long before, and I was still young enough that seeing them was a special treat: They were really fun for old people—full of long stories and laughter and games. They had a weakness for movies, too—particularly my grandmother. And one of her favorites was The Sound of Music.
I did not share her preferences. Remember, I was 13 or 14 at the time, so watching Maria spin around on a mountainside wasn’t high on my must-watch list (particularly since I’d already seen the thing). No matter: When Grandma heard that The Sound of Music was going to be on TV Thanksgiving night (in those days before ubiquitous DVDs and DVRs), we all knew what we’d be doing after cramming down the last string bean casserole and picking at our pumpkin pie.
One catch: Their TV room was made for two people, maybe three at the most—not six. And when we dragged in chairs for everybody, it was pretty clear that some viewers were going to be seeing more of someone’s elbows or knees than the Von Trapp family’s glowing faces. One unlucky soul would have to watch the movie reflected in Grandma’s glasses.
After some deliberation, a Solomon-esque solution was arrived upon: At every commercial break, we’d switch seats—rotating onto the chair, sofa or makeshift bench to our left.
In practice, this is what it was like:
Television: … I simply remember my favorite things, and then I don’t feeeeeeel soooooo baaaaaaad …
Grandma: “SWITCH!” (shuffle, shuffle, giggle)
Television: Maria, these walls were not built to shut out your problems. You have to face them. You have to live the life you were born to live.
Grandma: “SWITCH!” (giggle, shuffle, shuffle)
And so on. Like a well-oiled (if somewhat noisy) clock, we all rotated around the room—sitting on a nice, comfy easy chair for one blessed 11-minute, 48-second segment before being relegated to pillows on the floor the next.
To this day, every time I hear the “Do Ray Me” song or “Climb Every Mountain,” I can hear Grandma bellow, “SWITCH!” The Sound of Music is now inexorably linked to that evening, spent shuffling around my grandparents’ 19-inch television set. And since I’ve lately been peppered with reminders about NBC’s upcoming live version starring Carrie Underwood (it airs next week), I’ve been thinking about my grandparents a lot.
Of all the holidays on the calendar, none are more firmly fixed to the idea of family than Thanksgiving is. They’re not always the most comfortable holidays: Not everyone, after all, has the most comfortable of families. But we all understand instinctively that the moments spent together are special. We look around the table and thank God for the people sitting there. We prepare the food with family beforehand, wash up together afterward.
And around that near-sacred meal, we find other things to occupy our time. We might take walks or play games or simply talk. But lots of us turn to entertainment—a football game or favorite movie or new video game—to find common ground, to inspire discussion, to laugh over and share. As the tryptophan courses through our arteries and we count the minutes to pie, we find family—even if we find it while we’re all watching the same television screen.
Entertainment is a lot of things, and not all of them good. But at its best, it can be a catalyst for togetherness.
My grandma’s gone now. She died a few years ago from Alzheimer’s. She didn’t know most of us by the time she died. Indeed, the person who had been my grandma was gone long before.
But her love for The Sound of Music stayed with her to the end. When my mom would go to visit her, that’s what she always wanted to do: watch Julie Andrews spin and sing. And I wonder if, somewhere down deep, she still remembered that Thanksgiving evening, and maybe still hear herself shout between songs.
“SWITCH!”
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