The Annual Showing of The Wizard of Oz

It was in the fall when my mother would announce that on the coming Sunday the network would be showing "The Wizard of Oz" on television. This would mean that we would all, I mean Mom, Dad, and six children, would make our way the half mile or so to my paternal grandmother's home sometime just after dark. We would go to her house because that during the late sixties or early seventies my grandmother's huge color consol television was somewhat of a luxury.

Every year my little brother and I would begin by sitting in the floor as close to the television as we could. My mother would then caution us against sitting too close and later demand that we sit back. Always on the lookout for a new worry, mom had picked up somewhere that if you sit too close to the television a pulse of bright light will shoot out at you and will burn your retinas into corn flakes. So we had to sit back, I blame the Reader's Digest.

My grandmother would make really good popcorn in one of those special pans that had the crank to stir the bottom. She shook salt on it from a tin shaker about the size of a pop can and she gave us our own bowls about the time the movie would start. As a child it was quite entertaining to witness the explosion of color on that huge television as Dorothy emerged from that broken little house into the Land of Oz. I would almost hold my breath from then until the Lollipop Kids made their singing début. I still have trouble not singing along with them.

If you were to count the number of times I have watched this movie in my own childhood or with my two sons as an adult, the number must be in the hundreds by now. As far as what the story teaches us, best I can tell, it's about pet leash laws. I say this because every time Dorothy gets into trouble it's because her dog got away.

The best part of this movie for me is the cameo appearance by Melvin Stamper, who is a distant relative of Brian Stamper in Olive Hill, Kentucky who gets to say "She's dead, you killed her." This is a little known fact.

If the networks continue to show that movie every fall, somehow I've missed it. My own children don't appreciate the magic of this movie, they know we already have it on VHS and do not appreciate the once a year treat that the networks provided. The trouble is now that even though I can watch it anytime I like, I never do.

This isn't exactly something I share with the guys at the lodge but, about ten years ago a thoughtful coworker bought me my first Hallmark Wizard of Oz Collectable Christmas Ornament. Knowing how much I enjoyed that first ornament, my wife has taken it upon herself every year to buy the next in the series for me as a gift. It has since become somewhat of a tradition in our home of making a big deal of getting out these ornaments and decorating the Christmas tree. I know full well that the Wizard of Oz has nothing to do with Christmas but these little figurines have become my favorite holiday activity. It's just something fun and silly. The reason I like them so much is because they make me feel good. I like to put them on the tree and I like to look at them during the holiday season. Both my sons have their own ornaments that represent special things to them as well, but because I'm paterfamilias, my ornaments get top billing on the tree.

"The Wizard of Oz" represents to me a very special time in my life. It was on this one night during the year when we would get to stay up late, when we were all in a good mood, when we would all eat popcorn, and we would all get along. It was on this one night when for a passing moment the world revealed itself once again to be a naive, simple, beautiful place, full of boundless love. It was as though the badness in the world was put on pause long enough for us to watch this one movie. And it all happened every fall.