Friday Five

From the RevGals:

On Endings and Goodbyes:

1. Best ending of a movie/book/TV show
Bar none, the final scene of the final episode of Newhart was the best TV series ending I've ever seen. Bob Newhart played Dick Louden, an inn owner in Vermont, who was surrounded by a cast of lovable crazies (remember Larry, Darryl, and Darryl?). In the final episode, he gets hit in the head by a golf ball. The screen goes black.

"Then a light is turned on, and viewers see Newhart in bed, saying "Honey, you won't believe the dream I just had." Another light comes on, revealing not Dick Loudon's wife Joanna, but Bob Hartley's wife Emily (Suzanne Pleshette). The bedroom is a recreation from The Bob Newhart Show, and – in a parody of a 1980s television vogue – the entire Newhart series is revealed to have been a dream in the mind of Newhart's 1970s character. Bob tells Emily that in the dream, he lived in a weird Vermont town surrounded by strange people: a snobbish maid and her alliterative husband, a dense handyman, and three eccentric woodsmen, two of whom were mute.

When he reveals that he was married to a beautiful blonde in the dream, an annoyed Emily tells Bob to go back to sleep and flicks off the light on her side of the bedroom. Reviving a technique from The Bob Newhart Show, in which one of the Hartleys incredulously flicks back on a bedside light and restarts the conversation, Emily turns her light back on and inquires, "What do you mean, 'beautiful blonde?!' Bob tells her to go back to sleep, commenting, "You should wear more sweaters," something Joanna was noted for. The scene ends to the strains of the old Bob Newhart Show theme song (although this was removed for syndicated reruns)."
--from the Newhart Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newhart

**edit: runner-up for best ending is Fever Pitch with Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore. The only reason of course being that the Red Sox win the World Series.**

2. Worst ending of a movie/book/TV show
Hmmm....I'm having a tough time coming up with a single one that I'd say was the worst...but in general, I have a great dislike for nice, neat tidy endings. Life very seldom is nice, neat, or tidy. Give me some muck, some non-resolution, some lingering pain, sadness, or uncertainty.

3. Tell about a memorable goodbye you've experienced.
When Pastor Larry Meyer from the Lutheran Student Center passed away, his funeral and memorial service was an amazing, collective goodbye. It was Larry to a T--first, the public memorial service was in a large, classic sanctuary with one long aisle running down the middle and a big ol' pipe organ to blast the congregation out of their pews. He had specifically said he didn't want (as he put it) a "preacher parade," so the procession consisted only of family and participants in the service. There was no eulogy, but there were addresses to the family and congregation, stories told of the things he loved (even with props!), from cheap beer to Volkswagens, Husker football to sauerkraut. And it all came back to his love for Christ and more importantly, Christ's love for him. There were hundreds of people there, many of them former students from campus ministry, and the reception afterwards turned into a gigantic reunion. Larry would have loved nothing better than seeing old friends reunite, share stories, laugh and cry together.

4. Is it true that "all good things must come to an end"?
Yes, it is true, all things--good, bad, indifferent--must come to an end...except for one thing. And that thing is not merely "good," it is perfect. And it is eternal. AND it is given to us, through no deserving of our own, as a gift.

5. "Everything I ever let go of has claw marks on it." --Anne Lamott Discuss.
Letting go of something means relinquishing control over it. And that's the scariest thing. Whether it's our relationships, our things, our fears, our prejudices, our salvation...to let go is to say "I no longer control this. It's no longer in my hands." It takes faith and the willingness to open ourselves up to vulnerability.

Bonus: "It isn't over until the fat lady sings." I've never loved this expression. So propose an alternative: "It isn't over until ____________________"
For my fellow Red Sox fans: It isn't over until Bucky Freakin' Dent hits the home run. It isn't over until the ball goes through Bill Buckner's legs. It isn't over until Grady Little leaves Pedro in the game one inning too long.

LH