AWARDS FEVER
Kate scrabbles to secure a night at the Oscars
My eldest son and I have a little tradition that we started when he was a toddler. OK, maybe I started it – he probably was too young to be an active participant – but on the day of the Academy Awards, I would always throw a little Oscars “party” at home. Just for us. This was before the arrival of siblings.
It was less a “party” and more an opportunity to sit down with a cup of tea and watch some telly that wasn’t The Wiggles. So I sold it as our special party. I’d make popcorn and give him a SpongeBob SquarePants juice box. He’d sit still for three to five minutes until he got bored and went back to his Lego. But as the years wore by, somehow I continued to make it our thing. He’s always loved the arts, Hollywood, acting and movies. I’m sure it all started with The Wiggles stage show, where he tried to jump on stage with the purple Wiggle to try to “Wake up Jeff!”
As he grew up, he became obsessed with SaturdayNight Live and Comedy Central. His Oscars viewing with me became more of an intellectual dissection of the art and craft of movie-making and acting. He would provide great commentary and tidbits for me as I basically just ogled the frocks. Sometime last year, though, I cancelled our Sky Movies subscription. Mainly because we tended to just watch Netflix or Apple if we were watching a movie. The movies on Sky never seemed current, so it felt like a waste of money. But I hadn’t given a second thought to the Academy Awards.
Then this year, Oscars day rolled around. Unusually, I was oblivious to this as I was busy working. Suddenly my phone beeped with a text. It was my son: “Mum, it’s Oscars day – record it so we can watch together after school.”
Oh, my. Not only had I forgotten it was on, but we had no Sky Movies! But I couldn’t break our tradition. I couldn’t outgrow something he’d grown up with and now adopted as his thing! I jumped on the phone to Sky and waited on hold for almost as long as the awards ceremony itself until I could speak to a real person.
I asked if they could please kindly pop Sky Movies back on to my viewing schedule. “No problem!” the Sky lady replied, sounding chipper. “We have a special this month and it’s only going to cost you $9.99 to add it in for the first month.”
Phew! Not only could she do it on the spot so we didn’t miss the Oscars, but it was only going to cost us 10 bucks! Cheaper than one movie ticket.
I hit the record button and started boiling the kettle. As I poured the tea, it dawned on me how lucky I was to have a son still interested in sitting down with his mum to watch some telly together. I could never have foreseen at the toddler stage that we would still be doing this in his teens – that a little tradition I started (selfishly) to get some peace and quiet was now time I would be so grateful for.