¢ÝAmazing grace¢Ý
Once upon a time, our country was founded upon...
Faith.
Faith in all its forms.
But during the late nineteen-sixties, people...
Began looking heavenward...
And we have lift off of Apollo thirteen.
The bravest among us...
While the rest of us stood by with our support.
Our goodwill. And of course...
Damn!
Our taxes.
Already?
For my father, April was the cruelest month...
I bust my hump all year for this?
It wasn't that Dad didn't have faith in Uncle Sam.
He belive the taxes
Here ya are, honey.
It was just the part about paying them he resented.
So, from the moment the ol' ten-forty's arrived in the mail, life around the Arnold house...
Shifted into kind of a state of emergency.
Here, Daddy.
We all knew the drill.
And each of us...Had an assignment.
Apollo thirteen astronauts report smooth sailing on day one of their mission to the moon.
Kevin, turn down the damn TV!
My assignment was to turn down the damn TV.
Wayne's assignment was to be...
Well...
Invisible.
After that, it was all kind of up to Mom.
I'll put these in the file with the other forms.
See, even though Dad filled out the forms and...
Signed the checks...
It was Mom who kept the receipts, organized the paperwork...
Stockpiled the bi-carb...
And generally...
Anyone for dinner?
Kept Dad from eating us alive.
I bust my hump all year for this?
Still, for all his grumbling, on some level...
Dad knew taxes were inevitable.
Something you could depend on.
I want you to write your obituaries.
Death.
I think you'll find this very interesting.
Miss Stebbins was teaching us creative writing.
And we were learning that creative writing wasn't a book report...
Or "how I spent my summer vacation".
Creating writing was...
The end of your life.
What will they say about you in the newspaper?
Yes. Harold.
Which newspaper?
Any newspaper you like.
What did you do?
What did you accomplish?
What's the point of this?
Good question, Kevin!
We became engaged in Captain Ahab's obsessive quest...
We cried when Jane...
Why?
Yes, Harold?
Cuz they were dead?
Because...you cared about the characters.
Now, how do we write a character?
We start...
With the one we got to know about first.
Ourselves. Who are you..who were you...and where are you headed?
Faced with such profound...
One thought sprang immediately to our minds.
Yes, Susan.
How long does it have to be?
Oh...About a page.
One page?
One...page?!
Paul - it's not that bad.
How do you cram a full and productive lifetime into one page?
Kevin, don't you realize how deep this is?
Paul...aren't you taking this a little too seriously?
Heck - this wasn't brain surgery.
So many decisions to make, here!
Fr'instance...do I go into business with my dad, or marry Marsha Brady?
Or both!
Kev?
I don't want to die.
My best friend had...
What you might call...a malleable mind.
Me? I wasn't worried.
What was the big deal?
It was just a page - one lousy...little...page.
Thirty three lines.
Two hundred and ninety words.
If ya wrote big.
What's that?
Oh! Nothing.
Which was true.
I'd been staring at that page for an hour-and-a-half without coming up with a single word.
Some kind of writer's block, I guess.
An obituary? Oh, lemme see...maybe I can help.
Wayne...
Let's see...
"Kevin Arnold."
"Born a butthead."
"Lived a butthead's life."
"Died..."
"A butthead!" Did ya get any of that down?
Wayne! Stop teasing Kevin.
Your father's trying to watch the news.
Mom was serious. Every year...
The night before he paid his taxes, my father had a ritual...
Of watching the news.
We figured it made him feel better...
And he listen have keep has mind off.
Astronaut John Swigert today joked he'd forgotten to file his Federal income tax returns.
For new answers to old questions.
Journeyed into the unknown.
Have a seat.
Like, say...
And Rochester finally got married...
And disturbing questions...
We were just writing our obituaries, here.
To know that others were suffering.