Hey, folks – Max Bedroom here.
Mom’s shoveling the driveway and Dad is cooking dinner. I’m not a fan of either task, so I’m down here hiding in the basement. I figured while I’m making myself scarce I would pop another tape into the ol’ VCR. This time, I’m watching that classic 80s tv show about an alien with a smart mouth whose spaceship crash lands into the garage of the most boring family in America. That’s right, we’re talking about ALF.
Let me refresh your memory if you haven’t seen ALF recently. ALF stands for ‘alien life form’, although it should stand for ‘another lazy formulaic attempt leading (to) feelings (of) angst’. ALF’s real name is Gordon Shumway, but the Tanners just calls him ALF. Pretty rude. Reminds me of when I was a kid and Mom would call me Big Mouth because I liked catching large mouth bass. I have a name, Mother. It’s Max Bedroom.
Unlike aliens in other tv shows, ALF doesn’t really bother to hide from society. He might go out and get caught by the dog catcher or get mistaken for an ugly cousin. In this episode he is mistaken for a raccoon. It really greases the plot joints when you have an alien who doesn’t want to be discovered but also doesn’t need to bother hiding out in the house all day.
Here’s what I learned about life choices from ALF.
ALF Season 2 Episode 9: Night Train
- Some of the best times you’ll have in life will be when you have no money
Willie Turner has it all. A house. A smoke-show wife. Two mediocre kids. A job that gives him purpose. A wise-cracking alien living in his house. You know, the American dream. What he longs for, though, is that time when he rode the rails, hopping from town to town working odd jobs and having adventures. There’s something freeing about having no money and no responsibilities.
My problem with this logic is I currently have no money and few responsibilities and I’m pretty miserable. I’m not sure what I’m missing here. What made Willie so happy when he was riding the rails just scraping by? Was is the sense of freedom? Probably not. Was it the friends he made along the way? Doubt it. Was it the chance to see this vast continent, to take it all in from sea to shining sea? Nah. I think what made riding the rails so great for Willie was the trains themselves. Boys love trains. I wanted one of those big Lionel train sets for Christmas when I was eight. Instead I got a Dukes of Hazzard racetrack where the cars would jump the track. Still pretty cool.
I’ve made my decision. After Mom finishes shoveling the driveway and Dad finishes making dinner, I’m going upstairs to tell them I’ve figured out what I want to be. A hobo.
If you already have enough trains in your life and romance is more your fancy, then the next lesson is for you.
2. Past loves prepare us for our true love
While stuck on a freight car with ALF, Willie talks about a past love, and it isn’t his wife. How often, as he’s going through the routines of his mundane life, does Willie stop and think about his ex? Probably all the time. Who doesn’t? I think about both of my ex-wives all the time, and I hope that loving and losing twice has prepared me for my true love, who must be out there somewhere. All I know about her location is she isn’t in my basement.
I can’t be the only one. Would Ross and Rachel have worked if Ross hadn’t married the British lady? How about Monica and Chandler? Would they have gotten together if Monica hadn’t snuggled with Tom Selleck’s mustache? It’s funny that way; love, I mean. Our greatest losses can be our greatest moments. Put that on a t-shirt and send me a dollar.
Sick of all of this love talk and want to know if your life choices so far have been correct? Then read on, my friend.
3. For some people, it’s ok to keep riding that train
You probably think by ‘riding that train’ I mean that it’s ok to continue on your life’s trajectory. Some people never seem to grow up, they just keep doing what they’re doing with smiles on their faces, annoying the hell out of the rest of us sinners. No, I’m not talking about life. I’m talking about riding an actual train. It’s ok to keep doing that.
In the episode, Willie and ALF end up in a freight car on a moving train and run into a grade A, verified, and bonafide hobo. A real hobo in the 1980s. It turns out, through an incredible coincidence that doesn’t take us out of the realism of the story at all, that this hobo is an old friend of Willie’s from back in his own hobo days. Since then, Willie has gone on to build a successful, if boring, career. Get married. Have a couple of boring kids. And, oh yeah, he secretly houses a flippin’ alien. Not too bad. This guy, however, has continued to ride the rails all these years. He has no home, no wife, no boring kids, no wise-cracking alien. But what he does have is freedom, you know, the good kind of freedom. He has the freedom to be as poor as he wants to be. Which of these men has lived a better life? That’s not up to me to decide. I leave that to a higher power, maybe Hasselhoff. Let him judge our mortal lives. Amen.
Maybe you’re thinking Ok, great, live your own life. But what if my life is already messed up? What if my planet blew up? Don’t worry, friend. You know Uncle Max has got you covered. Those of you with blown up planets should move on to #4.
4. Even though your planet exploded, you can still remember the good times
The trauma that ALF suffers from losing his home planet and everyone he loved is overshadowed by his hijinks, poor writing, and the Tanner family’s apathy. ALF lost everything and everyone. He needs therapy. Instead, he gets yelled at for not vacuuming while the family was out at the mall or trying to eat the cat. He’s hungry.
ALF talks about this trauma on the train and realizes he can remember and talk about the good times. That reminds me of a similar trauma that I had my senior year of high school. I was on the way to the prom with my date and drove my truck into a ditch. The good news is some good ol’ boys from school who were on the way to the prom stopped to help. The bad news is they gave my date a ride and left me in the ditch. I never made it to the prom and somehow never saw her again. While I was waiting out there in the dark for someone to stop to help me, the smell of gasoline and cigarettes from the guys who picked up my date still lingering in the air, I found a half-empty, I mean half-full, pack of Marlboros. I didn’t smoke and still don’t, but at the time I figured why not and used my truck’s cigarette lighter to light up.
I sat in the back of my truck looking up at the field of stars taking draws from those cigs and feeling, just for a moment, that I was on top of the world. That feeling lasted right up until the point where I started throwing up. Still one of the best nights of my life.
Bonus lesson: If you’re going to write for an 80’s sitcom, learn to write a joke or two, you hacks.
Willie tells ALF that back in his hobo days he ate beans from a can and he even had a nickname. Now imagine you’re a writer for ALF. Once you stop crying over your life choices, think about the joke you would write with that setup. Beans give us all kinds of possibilities. They could have gone with something as simple as the Gas Man. Or Wilie Eat More Beans. Or the Fiber Rider. What did they go with? Boxcar Willie. They completely ignored the bean setup and they just ripped off the name of a country singer who used to sell cassette tapes on tv commercials. Come on, guys. Like my high school cross country coach once said to me, “You don’t have to be good but you have to at least try.” I would take it a step further than that, Coach. You don’t even have to really try…just pretend that you’re trying.
Signing off
Well, folks, I’ve fixed my spaceship and am now heading back to my home planet, where the cats are plentiful and the jokes are all one-liners. Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon enough to dust off another of these tapes so that I can share more wisdom from the 80s.
Until then, keep your cats skittish and your train a-rollin’.