This past weekend, we traveled to Texas to attend a funeral for my wife’s grandfather.  It was a small ordeal with only immediate family present.  I admit, I was only able to meet her grandfather a couple times, and I don’t remember him that well.  She was very close to him, however, and I could tell how much it sapped her.

In addition, this past Saturday, March 25, was the one year anniversary of my own father’s passing.  We attended a graveside memorial for him before breaking off for the airport to make our way to Texas.  Large groupings are not really my way to mourn, I confess, as I feel pressured to put on an emotional display that doesn’t really fit me.  This isn’t to say I don’t cry or am embarrassed to do so in front of crowds – it just isn’t what I want to do.

For me, I prefer to think of the good times.  With my father, one of the greatest things I remember was Thursday nights when I was growing up.  My mother attended an amateur bowling league with her work girlfriends, and that left my father to deal with my younger brother and me.  He would pick us up after school like always, but on the way home, he’d stop at McDonald’s or some other fast food restaurant.  He’d get food for the three of us, and we’d head back to the house.

When we got home, he would pull a VHS tape off the entertainment center.  This tape had been sitting on the shelf since Saturday nights.  It was a jewel among our other tapes, and we yearned for Thursday evenings just for this tape.  You see, this tape held that week’s episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.  For the uninitiated – shame.  SHAME!  MST3K was a low-budget show in which the host was trapped on a spaceship and forced to watch extremely bad movies by a mad scientist.  In order to survive, the host and his robot pals would riff on the movies and perform skits as host segments.

This was the greatest thing for us.  We would laugh so hard we’d cry.  We’d choke on food or drink to the point it became a joke for us that we should avoid food while watching the show.  But every Thursday night into our teen years, we would watch this show.  Every week, it was something just for the three of us.  It was quality time we got to spend with our father, and when the show finally ended, we were so sad.  For Father’s Day, we bought him DVD compilations.

Then came word that the old crew was running a Kickstarter campaign to reboot the series.  It was the only Kickstarter my father ever donated to, and he was so excited to talk about it.  We were amped up for it, and I was even moreso when I found out Felicia Day and Patton Oswalt would have a part in it.  Unfortunately, my father would die from cancer complications before it was ready to go.  That’s all right because I will watch it for the both of us.

To the old MST3K crew, thank you for the excellent memories.  Thank you for a great way to spend time with my dad.  To the new MST3K crew, thank you for creating something that had him bouncing off the walls with joy even if he never got to see the final product.  These are the kinds of memories I will always treasure – the kind I will share with my children.  Thank you, Joel and Mike and Felicia and Mary-Jo and Jonah.  Thank you, Bill and Kevin.  Thanks for everything you’ve done.

 

In memory of Michael Muncy and Mahlon Freeman – two men who are desperately missed.