the fourth...dimension

all my growing up, I waited in anticipation for the fourth of july to roll around, so I could wake up and park myself in front of the television for a 16-hour stint of the twilight zone marathon.

twice a year, on the fourth and on thanksgiving, channel 5 (ktla! home of the family film festival!) would run an 8am-to-midnight marathon of rod serling-hosted morality tales. be nice to your neighbors, even when under threat of alien control. think happy thoughts lest the neighbor boy turn you into a human jack-in-the-box. be vigilant in checking your walls for rips in the fabric of time and space. you know, the usual.

there were some that you'd see every year: the murderous chatty cathy, darren from bewitched and his day being able to hear people's thoughts, the nerdy book-loving banker at the end of the world, willoughby, "to serve man", all of the ones where you accidentally sell your soul to the devil only to have him cash it in at the worst time possible (pb, beware!)...

but there were always a few that I was never able to catch. my sister told me of one where the humans kill the alien bearing the gift of a cancer cure in a fit of humanness (that on the twilight zone always expresses itself in murder), and I waited around for years trying to catch it. I even doubted its existence, considering that by the time I left my parents' home (and its cable hookup), I'd taken it approximately 350 hours of marathon time. surely, I'd've caught it once?

you would think that, wouldn't you? but it wasn't until I bought myself Twilight Zone: The Complete Definitive Collection last year that it was confirmed--Season 3, Episode 97: The Gift. after all these years, I feel like burgess meredith's henry bemis. all the time in the world to luxuriate in all the piles and piles of episodes I've ever wanted. of course, now that I have it, I haven't even opened most of the DVDs. who has time for 156 segments? how do you choose which ones to watch?

thank god for the sci fi channel. it's 1.25 and I've already gotten in billy talking to his dead grandma, a colony face-off between martians and venutians in a diner, and several planes flying into the future/past. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that there's an alien walking into a mexican village with a notebook under his arm coming up.

Happy Fourth of July