Attentively and all the way through ...

Marlene Terry

OK. I admit it. I'm already one day behind in my traditional "A Christmas Movie Every Day," project.

Really I have in my personal collection 25 films that even though critics blasted a few of them, are favorites of mine. And in order to see every one, it's necessary for me to begin viewing them on Dec. 1.

Usually I can't wait to see George C. Scott in "Christmas Carol." So until this year, that's always been the first on my list.

This year however I decided to put the titles of the films in a bowl, draw one out each day and watch that movie, attentively and all the way through.

That's why I'm a day behind. Because it was very late on Sunday when I began watching O'Henry's "The Gift of Love," starring Marie Osmond, Timothy Bottoms and James Woods.

... I mean I started it twice. ... The first time around 10:30 p.m., and missed, by being unconscious, everything that happened from the time Beth (the heroine) gets engaged to Alfred (the nerd) and then meets Rudi, a cute young man from Switzerland, to the part where Beth is crying her eyes out at the boat dock after Rudi supposedly has left for home.

... It was her screeching little cry that woke me up.

Now everyone who has seen that movie knows the best part of the story lies in between those scenes. So I started the film over and with a bag of caramel popcorn to keep me company ... you guessed it. I fell asleep AGAIN!

The next time I was jolted into reality and cleared my head and eyes, Beth had been disowned by her Uncle Albert for running off to marry Rudi, of all people. ... You know. The nice young man from Switzerland who didn't leave for home after all, but came back to ... marry Beth.

And when I was finally able to focus on the screen, Beth was all dressed up in her friend's (Mary) mother's wedding dress, waiting to be married.

... By the way has anyone else ever noticed that dress she wore was bigger than the room she was standing in?

Suffice it to say it was a stroke of luck that I woke up when I did ...  just in time to hit the pause button on the remote and stop the story before I ruined the whole thing by seeing the ending without most of the rest of the movie.

... Guess I'll try again a little earlier tonight. ... Because those movies need to be seen attentively, speech by speech, and all the way through in order for us to sigh, swoon, and cry spontaneously ... as if we really don't know what's going to happen next!

♦ Hope you'll let me share YOUR stories and photos here at my residence "In a Nutshell." Email me at nutshellstories@gmail.com.