Home to Nebraska

Even though we had watched it last Friday, I came home the other day and put The House Without a Christmas Tree on once more.

I love this story so much. It's a combination of everything: the characters, the storyline, and the setting. I especially appreciate the setting as so many period pieces are so obviously trumpeting "this is a period piece and look at all the neat costumes/props we have from the era." The 1940s postwar era is portrayed in this story as ordinary life: there is no trumpeting--that's just the way it is. And what a homey (or "homely," as the British say) setting: the kitchen and living room remind me of many of my relatives' homes before they were remodeled. Look at the hoosier cabinet in the kitchen, the stove, James' easy chair, the fireplace...it's truly like going home.

I adore Addie. She reminds me somewhat of myself, with the drawing and enjoying school, but I could only have wished for this child's self-confidence and assertiveness. I delight in her creativity. It would have been so easy to make her father the villain--I'm certain a modern production of the story would have--but instead one can see his own pain beneath his gruffness and occasional cruelty. What he can't express in words he does in small things: leaving Addie a cupcake from his lunch, teaching her physical and mental skills. He is a marvelously complicated character.

The schoolroom is perfect. I would have loved to attend Miss Thompson's classes, warm with steam heat, with the memorable scents of chalk and wood and the traces of sweet pea perfume, learning vocabulary and music and history.

Even the theme music is memorable, as well as the collage commercial segues. On tape they divide the story into acts like a classy stage play.

The sequels are also good, especially the first (Thanksgiving Treasure), but nothing quite equals this lovely Christmas story. A pity it isn't on DVD. Anyone listening out there at CBS???? (Or are we simply to drown in CSI clones for the rest of our lives?)