Happy New Year!!!

Happy New Year!!!

Just for the record, I want to be clear that I will NOT be waiting to meet you atop the Empire State Building!! I'm famous for miscommunications, so I do not want to be held responsible for anyone waiting for hours, expecting me to show up.  I'm in Houston, not in NY.  Do not be hurt, mad or upset.  Do not hunt me down and unload on me for not making it as agreed-- we have NO arrangement, NO agreements...

Ok, just wanted to sleep well tonight.

"When Harry met Sally (Sorry, Sallie, they spelled her name wrong.)," "Sleepless in Seattle" and "Affair to Remember" are three of my New Year's favorite movies.  You just can't go wrong with any of these. Of course, "Affair to Remember" is the original-- and it's alluded to in "Sleepless..." 

Of course, being a guy, my favorite scene from all three movies, collectively, is when Tom Hanks' character (in Sleepless in Seattle) watches his sister (played by Tom's wife, btw) start babbling and cry while describing. "that scene" from "Affair to Remember." Tom is bewildered by her breakdown. Her husband just looks at Tom and says, "Don't worry, she gets this way sometimes."

The story goes that Tom Hanks went off-script, and started ad-libbing. He breaks down and starts crying, identifying with her, "I know what you mean," he sobs. "It's like in 'The Dirty Dozen' when Trini Lopez loses his legs..." The actor playing the husband chimes right in and starts ad-libbing himself, adding to the scene and sobbing with Tom.

I have watched this scene over and over, trying to get the "fly on the set" feel for this scene. The director says she rarely cuts when Tom is on set. So I watch the sister in the scene, as she goes from crying, to being incredulous, to laughing. She pulls it off perfectly-- it's so believable that the sister would go through those transistions.  But it's also believable that the actress (Rita something, I think) just broke character and started laughing at her husband's sharp wit.  Who knows? It is a great story and a great scene-- either way.

New Year's is always time to reflect and to look forward with anticipation and hope.  Any of these movies will set the mood for both reflection and looking forward.  We all want love and companionship-- whether we admit it or not-- and our journey is sweeter if we realize that it's not about waiting for the right person to come along. It is about getting and being prepared internally to be ready when that right one does appear.

Harry has Sally in his life for years before he is ready. But it is more about our journey than it will ever be about a perfect love story.

So, for this coming year, I wish you a year of health, of wealth, of love and happiness!!

Warm regards,
Fred T Wyrick