Dec 7

Dec 7 Shrubbery

My Dad is a lot like Santa Claus, not just in appearance but in mannerisms as well. When he thinks something is funny, he REALLY laughs, and his belly shakes like a bowl full of jelly. Once that happens, you can’t help but laugh yourself.

Some time when I was 10, 11, or 12, I happened upon my father belly-laughing while watching Monty Python and The Holy Grail. He was prone to watching Arthur-esque movies, but this one was different. Some hunched-over chap was following King Arthur around clapping together a couple of coconuts to imitate a horse gallop since Arthur was only pretending to ride a horse. How bizarre! At first, my older sister and I stuck around just to enjoy our Dad belly-laughing, but eventually, we were laughing less at him laughing and more at what we were now also absorbed in watching—our eyes had been opened to the beautiful and irreverent world of Monty Python.

Shortly after the movie finished playing, we had to go to church… along with my mother who had been appalled that our father had let us watch The Holy Grail with him. Midway through church while we were supposed to be kneeling in silent prayer, I said under my breath, only loud enough for my sister and Dad to hear me imitating dead collecting Eric Idle saying, “Bring out your dead!” and then I smacked my forehead against the thick church hymnal to make the thud of the dead as they were plopped into the wooden cart. Of course, this made them both laugh, but since we were in church, we couldn’t laugh out loud, so the three of us tried to hold it in and ended up shaking.

Well, kids shaking a bit doesn’t cause too much of a distraction because most kids shift around and fidget during church anyway. A grown Santa-man shaking + two kids, however… well, that tends to make the church pew bounce quite a bit which caught the attention of my dismayed mother and the more properly behaved churchgoers around us. Seeing that our Mom was upset (her death stares gave it away), our Dad would try to get serious and signal us to stop, but as soon as our eyes would meet, or we’d look at the hymnals, it would start up again. All of our faces and tummies hurt from trying to contain our laughter which we hadn’t succeeded at very well at all. After church, our family friends who had been seated many rows behind us asked us what had been so funny. They were and are Python-aficionados, and much to our Mom’s chagrin empathized with our predicament. Python is funny stuff!

This collection is dedicated to my Dad, my sister, and our family friends—you know who you are, our friend Tim (at least that’s what we call him as some do), and Python fans everywhere. Now peruse this collection of Monty Python-inspired creations, you sons and daughters of a silly person, before I taunt you a second time!