Right to the Heart

Something that always gets me in sad movies is the staged home movie footage. You know the kind. In the movie, a parent passes away and in the midst of the drama and grieving, someone walks in to find the poor little kid watching old camcorder tapes of the parent--happy, smiling, laughing, and doing something incredibly fun. Always with the fun. Last night we watched No Reservations and without fail, the little girl was watching she and her Mom tromping around on the beach, hugging, laughing. It's about the sweetest thing, and it breaks my heart every time.

And it should. But you know what gets me worst than the sympathy for the little girl? This thought: I don't think I have that footage. Really. If something happened to me, truly, I don't think there is a tape like that that the kids can watch and see happy/fun Mom and remember her in the best possible light, running around the beach or laughing. Now I don't want to have to watch and confirm this, but I'm pretty sure that our home movies don't usually have me in them, and if they do, I always sound weird. I am not smiling. Mostly I have that look a lot of us give the camera (or our husbands behind it) that says "get that thing out of my face" or "you know I don't have any makeup on right now". In fact, I dare say that I believe I've trained Brian to essentially keep the lens off of me. And now I'm wondering if that's a good idea.

So here's what I want to know. Do other people have this spontaneous, happy, loving footage of themselves snuggling with their kids, laughing, and seeming like the most perfect, beautiful (and skinny!) parent? Or is it just me?

Perhaps I should loosen up a little and try to be myself in the home movies more. I mean, if I died, how would they ever make a movie about me?