i entertain no grandiose notions that my life would make an interesting movie. there are no juicy secrets or high-adventure feats of strength. we have our share of beauty and tragedy, but these things drive good dinner-table conversation, not ticket sales and screen lit wonder.

but still — i fantasize about being the subject of a movie’s intro. you know, that part before anything actually HAPPENS, where the scene is being set, and characters are making their definitive first impressions. there is music playing and the viewers see the star of the story for who she is in her daily routine, when she thinks nobody is watching.

today, for example, i would be played by mary louise parker.

and the music in the background is the theme song from “elmo’s world,” in all of its overly saccharine, raspy, grating, monster cuteness.

the main character, with tousled bed-hair and clothes appropriate for the 6 a.m. video torture yoga session she shared with her husband, trips on a big wheel (yes, inside the house) on the way to make breakfast for her two children.

“elmo can use the potty!” the exuberant tv voice exclaims.

“do you need to tee tee?” our heroine is reminded to ask her oldest son.

the babysitter arrives just as the husband leaves for work (when did he have time to shower?). elmo spreads more cheer as mary louise, clad now in the tangled arms of protesting children who are anticipating their mother’s brief sojourn, makes her way to the bedroom to dress for the day.

while brushing her teeth, she extrapolates the younger child’s hands from the toilet water (clean this time, thank goodness), before leaning over the older son’s blockade in order to spit into the sink. she grabs a pair of jeans off the floor and the first shirt she sees and puts them on just before tying her hair into a messy bun. no time for a shower today.

the older son brightens at the prospect of making cookies with the babysitter and specifies that they must be oatmeal cookies. a collective trip through the den and into the kitchen is accompanied by more melodious elmo musings as he is apparently wrapped in deep conversation with his fish, dorothy.

mary louise diligently lines up her son’s apron and the necessary cookie ingredients on the kitchen counter. this is a 15 minute process, which in her estimation, is costing her two dollars and fifty cents at her baby sitter’s ten-dollars-an-hour rate. she finally wriggles free of both children long enough to run to the car and head to a coffee shop, where she will plan the evening’s bible study that is part of her work as a minister.

in the last scene of the intro, mary louise sinks into a comfortable coffee shop couch and savors the first sip of caffeine. a fast alt-punk song is playing in the background. the waitress stops by to ask what our heroine wants for breakfast. mary louise orders an oatmeal, and as she’s handing the menu back to the server, the fast-talking girl asks, “are you pregnant?”

“thank you, but no,” mary louise quips. “i shouldn’t have tried to pass off this swimsuit cover up as a shirt,” she thinks to herself.

let the day (or the movie) begin…

[today is the last day to enter to win a custom-made superkid cape for a super kid in your life. check out this post for details.]