Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo
Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo was the song of the fairy godmother in the Disney version of Cinderella. When the fairy godmother appears, Cinderella has hit rock bottom. The wicked stepsisters have destroyed her dress for the ball and she seems doomed to continue living her dreary life. The actual title is the “Magic Song”. It is composed almost entirely of nonsense words, but no one turns off the movie at this point.
Let’s face it, we all love to have some magic in our lives. For me the magic is usually finding a few coins or maybe even a dollar bill in a coat pocket. Late in the summer of 2001 the world received a huge infusion of magic with the creation of the Hallmark Channel.
Year-round Hallmark movies provide neatly packaged, happily-ever-after stories, but none are as well known, and maligned for their sappiness, as the Hallmark Christmas stories. Every story line involves a renewed relationship that is finding a new life that has the same level of obstacle and angst as a middle school crush. The background is always the small town where everyone walks the quaint streets of shops in lovely wool coats with red scarves. The snowfall is never inconvenient or dirty or icy. And the red pickup truck, parked directly in front of the favored shop, might be ancient but it runs pretty well.
Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo. It’s a great fantasy to ease us into the Christmas season, the season of hopefulness and goodwill. Everything will work out, including wrapping that awkward sized present that you wish you hadn’t bought, but you know the recipient is going to love. Wrapping presents is my Hallmark watch window. I stink at wrapping, and cutting and not taping the tape to itself. If it isn’t the festival or the town-wide cookie exchange, the movie has a gift-wrapping event full of expert wrappers. In true holiday fashion the scene makes me green with envy while my cheeks are red with frustration.
The lead character (LC) has my wrapping skills and is in deep anguish, like me. My worry is not losing the tape while LC is in deep torment over the pending decision, which is always falls into one of two categories, although sometimes both, relationship or work. LC is working as a securities analyst with an outstanding firm in a big city, but always wanted to design and paint. The trip home to the small town reminds LC of his/her long-buried ambition when the set for the festival’s display needs to be designed. The local designer has suffered a broken leg in a ski accident that happened outside of their cheerful town. The local designer begs LC to step up and keep the town’s festival tradition alive.
Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo. The Yoda of this Hallmark movie, although far more attractive than the real Yoda and perhaps wiser, speaks to LC: “You must follow your heart.” The Hallmark Channel goes to a commercial break. In that break anyone who even momentarily considered a major in something like philosophy rather than finance or nuclear physics knows that rarely happens. In real life the Yoda of the Hallmark movie instantly becomes the Demon in the Exorcist movie spewing greenish bile amid exhortations of ‘I’m not paying tuition for if you major in that; where do you think you’ll get a job and don’t think you’ll be living here for the rest of your life.’
It’s all bibbidi-bobbidi-boo if one is only using the predictable Hallmark movie as distraction to keeping the wrapping session going. I think the real magic of the ‘follow your heart moment’ is always left on the cutting room floor.
Before sweeping up in the cutting room let’s review the missing frames. Yoda cheered for the LC when she/he moved to the big city. The variety of opportunities in the big city seem like magic to the young professional. Over the years LC shares with Yoda specific and measurable milestones as well as hopes and dreams. Yoda begins to view the world differently through LC’s eyes. These are all functions of forgiveness. Forgiveness widens one’s point of view. Forgiveness leads to more understanding and compassion. Forgiveness is not forgetting, which is why Yoda can’t say, ‘I was wrong, you should have pursued philosophy in the first place,’ because LC could only hear it as the snot nosed kid, she/he was years ago. Time passes. Things change and even wise people don’t fully see it.
Tis the season to talk about goodwill. Goodwill doesn’t mean that we like everything or everyone all the time. That’s where a sense of forgiveness comes in. Forgiveness allows one to look forward to new possibilities for yourself and others. Goodwill can’t exist without forgiveness.
Put ‘em together and what have you got?
Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo.