Last night I hung out with my BFFs and watched the Broadway rendition of Pee Wee’s Playhouse on HBO. Much Moscato was had (Barefoot wine is the best I think) and many more laughs. It was a delight and a strange, emotion-inducing evening. More on that in a mo…

I’m not one to lie or to keep things from those I care about. So I will be frank with you here. I have been in quite the funk lately. I have been nearly unable to write anything going on two weeks now. I don’t know what happened. I just woke up one morning, got to work and started my usual routine, only suddenly when I went to type up a blog post: NOTHING! *crickets* I figured no biggie and went about my life things. Sadly, this funk o’ mine has not let up. I am an over-thinker, for sure. I have thought my way through many things. I consider self-work to be quite valuable if not entirely necessary. Yet I can’t seem to pull myself out of this funk. Though I suppose just writing this little bit proves progress of some nature. I shall have to find some small way to celebrate just that!  I share this with you not to apologize or beg for forgiveness. I share not to explain myself or to hold any false interest. I share because I must! I share because I can! I share because I believe deep in my very soul that without the sharing of knowledge and experiences with one another that there is little other reason to exist on this planet or to have a life to live.  I am grateful for all that I have and the opportunities and relationships I know, too. Wouldn’t change a thing and wouldn’t ask for more. But you know how it is when you’re just not feeling entirely yourself? Yeah, that’s been me for too long if you ask me. Ha!

…I had luckily caught a guest appearance by Pee Wee Herman a few weeks ago on the Conan O’Brian show. Yes, I do know that the actor’s name is Paul Reubens. This appearance, however, was most certainly Pee Wee himself  (he was fully in character)!  Just seeing his face, in that outfit, on Conan’s show? I was suddenly a kid again and completely swept-up and in awe of Pee Wee, everyone’s BFF! I was on the edge of my seat, riveted to the spot! I watched in wonder and delight as he and Conan chatted and then PW did some silly-funny balloon trick that kills me even now! Oh wait! It’s the year 2011, I can just SHOW YOU!!!

Hooray for technology! Woo! Ahem. Okay, where was I? Oh yeah, PW! Just seeing his face after all of these years? It brought tears to my eyes. I felt like that lady at the grocery store when she saw the sausage of her childhood! I can’t exactly explain the emotions I was feeling at that moment, other than to say that there was immediate familiarity, nostalgia, grief/loss/sadness and finally JOY!!! I’m going to lay this right out in the open for all to read: I think that the way Mr. Reubens was treated due to his minor arrest after being caught-up in a police sting operation and was arrested for sex charges when detectives allegedly saw him playing with his private parts, was complete and utter BULLSHIT!!! In fact no one even recognized him until he was released and someone realized that under the long hair and goatee was none other than Pee Wee himself.  Needless to say the media frenzy and public demands of his show’s removal from the Saturday Morning cartoon lineup pretty much erased Pee Wee Herman and his much beloved Playhouse from pop culture…but not for good! He maintains to this day that it wasn’t he they “saw” masturbating and had even prepared evidence through an expert that would have testified had the case gone to trial.

It was such a blow to my kid-brain that I think I blocked it for awhile. The film “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure” meant and still means the world to me. His T.V. show a brief escape from the woes that belong to a poor kid. And so seeing a return, even if only a mostly symbolic and possibly fleeting one, means even more so to a gal who’s gone from hell and back and lived to tell the tale. Had I the opportunity to embrace Paul Reubens I would give him the warmest and most loving of death fattie hugs the world has ever beheld! Just thinking about it brings tears to my eyes and a chill to my flesh. In my eyes? He is as close as you can get to saintly. What he has given me and so many other kids and adults means more than anything a politician has done in ages!

When Pee Wee’s Playhouse went off the air, my little brother and I got by on a VHS tape we had of the original stage production, starring the usual array of PW characters, but I had forgotten just how many times we’d watched that thing. It probably disintegrated eventually from use. So last night watching those characters again gave me such joy and such melancholy that I can’t quite let go. I can’t let go of the fact that this newest show was so like that original production from the set to the plot lines to the very words that came out of most of the characters’ mouths! Yet one thing was missing for sure: Captain Carl as played by the late Phil Hartmen. Miss Yvonne looked as radiant as ever, but I didn’t feel the chemistry between her and Cowboy Curtis as I did with Captain Carl. This made me a little sad, but the guy is dead and what can ya do? There was some modernizing of the plot with installation of cable internet and such. I wasn’t terribly interested in that though. I was merely there to bare witness to the magic and wonder that is Pee Wee Herman.

When the show was over last night, I was satisfied and delighted! And I have now vowed to re-watch all of the episodes of his old show all over again! The humor was so different than anything you’d see now. Yet it was all lighthearted and in good fun! There were lessons learned and new “friends” to get to know and love. Nothing brings me more joy than seeing Paul Reubens’ face under the guise of Pee Wee Herman. Even after all of these years and the various films I’ve gone to see him in, there’s just nothing quite like PW! He is a genius. I wish him all of the best of success and love and anything that life has to offer him. Were he a guest in my home or cafe I would treat him like royalty or better yet, family!

I think I am still processing all of the various emotions I went through last night. Lucky for me I was surrounded by my nearest and dearest and that is more than alright! And for those who’d like to take that trip down memory lane, I give you a masterpiece: