Below is a scene adapted from the film, "Away We Go"
This scene found me in the throes of parenting & reminded me of my role as a new parent.
INTERNATIONAL HOUSE OF PANCAKES -- MIDNIGHT
(Burt & Verona are about to have a baby & are out with their friends Tom & Munch who have a couple of kids. Tom is telling them what it means to be a family. The four of them are in a booth. Tom is feasting on a large
stack of pancakes, with an enormous side of bacon).
TOM
And here’s your house.
(He sticks 4 toothpicks into his pancakes to represent walls and a coaster on top as its roof)
But what is this? Is that home, is
that a family? No, no. Course not.
That’s just the raw material -- the
people, the walls, the furniture,
your jobs, maybe a nanny or
grandmother. The basics. That’s not
a family, that’s not a home. The
thing that binds it all together is
this. (He holds up the maple syrup & begins to pour it all over the toothpick “house”)
This is love.
This is your love, guys, your
patience, your consideration, your
better selves. Man, you just have
no idea how good you can be! But
you have to use all of it.
(the syrup is everywhere
now, inches of it)
It’s not like simple brick and
mortar, where you use a little
layer of mortar between the bricks.
With this, you have to use TONS of
it. For every brick, there’s a halfton
of mortar.
It’s the glue. It’s all those
good things you have in you -- the
love, the wisdom, the generosity,
the selflessness, the patience.
Patience at 3am, patience after
work, patience when you feel like
your life is passing you by and
you’re waiting for your baby to
burp -- you have to amp that
patience aspect so much it’ll make
you sick.
Man, you have to be so
much better than you ever thought!
INTERNATIONAL HOUSE OF PANCAKES -- MIDNIGHT
(Burt & Verona are about to have a baby & are out with their friends Tom & Munch who have a couple of kids. Tom is telling them what it means to be a family. The four of them are in a booth. Tom is feasting on a large
stack of pancakes, with an enormous side of bacon).
TOM
And here’s your house.
(He sticks 4 toothpicks into his pancakes to represent walls and a coaster on top as its roof)
But what is this? Is that home, is
that a family? No, no. Course not.
That’s just the raw material -- the
people, the walls, the furniture,
your jobs, maybe a nanny or
grandmother. The basics. That’s not
a family, that’s not a home. The
thing that binds it all together is
this. (He holds up the maple syrup & begins to pour it all over the toothpick “house”)
This is love.
This is your love, guys, your
patience, your consideration, your
better selves. Man, you just have
no idea how good you can be! But
you have to use all of it.
(the syrup is everywhere
now, inches of it)
It’s not like simple brick and
mortar, where you use a little
layer of mortar between the bricks.
With this, you have to use TONS of
it. For every brick, there’s a halfton
of mortar.
It’s the glue. It’s all those
good things you have in you -- the
love, the wisdom, the generosity,
the selflessness, the patience.
Patience at 3am, patience after
work, patience when you feel like
your life is passing you by and
you’re waiting for your baby to
burp -- you have to amp that
patience aspect so much it’ll make
you sick.
Man, you have to be so
much better than you ever thought!
I love that last line..."you have to be so much better than you ever thought!" So very true.
2 comments:
agreed! i also like the line about feeling like your life's passing you by while you wait for your baby to burp. they're going to be 18 before we know it, and we'll WISH we could still hold them on our laps and watch them sleep, or make them giggle...
Love the syrup analogy! Pour it on!!
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