Waking up in the middle of the morning, with the sun behind clouds of snow, the knees feel the cold and move gingerly. Each flex and bend looking to generate enough warmth before kicking back and flooding the kneecaps with more than just a slap. No sweat for midday, shivers me timbers, sonny.
Holding the fingers down in this situation of tickle reading in the middle of the parking lot, Billy Crystal's 700 Sundays.
From his Broadway show, this conscription into words and pages loses the kind of free flowing folly found in the conversational stage version. Even without the gesture of asides, jumping to the margins and columns in aisles, it's a solid and entertaining read that stands well on natural footing. Or as natural as listening to someone talk in print allows.
Smiles and nods creep from sides of the mouth and under the ears, where the murderous slash befouls many a victim, and the constant manages to keep throughout the entirety of the book. Here and there, mood and recollection hint to revel in the face of facts that even this man is more than just an Academy Awards show hosting machine, however old the crank in the back. Or even more than an actor with gammy chops the size of boulders.
Crystal's leisurely walk into his upbringing, all while fondly remembering his dad of whom said Sundays are with, is as amazing as the characters which pop up in the chapters, be they family or very close friends of the close-knit clan. Turning one page after another, the collection of memories is haphazard after a fluid and linear start. Thankfully, or ruefully, the hammer hits a few times on points and even phrases marking them out, standing up and asking, can you dig it?
Ringing in the ears as if Crystal is reading back the pages himself, enjoyable to the feat of having a one-sided conversation that leaves awe and appreciation in its wake. What remains, after meeting so many of his family and some of his friends, is the emotion and the experience of walking into his house. Of the fun and memories littering his life in stark contrast to the darkness left in the early death of his father.
With Papa Crystal on the back cover
Crystal holds nothing back in letting it out and so brings it all in. Fireside chat without the 451, the prospect of warming up breaks over the wall of logs ready for the fire bursting out from the overheating engine. And in this kind of weather, really. Throw the book onto the flames and catch another aspect of a genial exhalation.
Funny and sad, it's sunny mixing in with the cold of snow closing up the window to the world outside. Looking out there and asking for more. Knowing that what's around in the here and now is most precious for the time still standing. How this book ends is a thing of fleeting memory. Kind of like talking to someone and knowing what the last thing was said, but not really caring about the exact words.
Drive off into the late afternoon with the last pages of the book upon itself.
Reviewed on Tuesday, 27 May 2008