Just Sit Right Back...

Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip...

Just how hard of a time do you think you would have finding someone who grew up in the 60's or 70's who to this day can't sing that little lyric or even more so just see their face light up at the mentioning of the word's "Gilligan's Island". Yes, I am one of those people. I basically grew up in the seventies.

When I got home from school we didn't have the Internet, our own phones to chit-chat with our friends, heck, we didn't even have cable-tv! But we did have one thing, we had Gilligans Island! No matter how bad our day went at school or how bad our teachers picked on us (unfairly of course!), we knew that Gilligan, Skipper, the Professor, Mary Ann (my heart-throb!), Ginger, & the Howells would be there every day to make us laugh!

How ironic would it be that now in this life that I would actually be living out just a small piece of Gillgan's Island? More then once, many times actually I've been compared to the Skipper. I'm not sure why other then we're both big ol' teddy bears (I'm actually about 2 inches taller and a little heavier set) & we've both got "Little Buddies!" My Little Buddy is my son Andrew who is 11 years old and has autism. If you could find a picture of Gilligan (Bob Denver) when he was 11, I bet they'd look a lot alike!

When I heard the announcement today that we'd lost Gilligan a big part of that kid inside of me wanted to cry. It was then that I heard the music start...

"Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip..."

I smiled.

When I heard the music I knew that Gilligan might have left us but I can testify to this: "Gilligan is still here, living in the smile of this little boy!" As many problems I had as a kid growing up with ADHD in the seventies and having a childhood I don't care much to look back on, there is one thing that I will always enjoy reflecting back on in my childhood. That one thing is Gilligan's Island.

I think that this weekend I might just have invite my family to join me so I can share with my wife & kids one the greatest rituals ever known to a kid, an afternoon snack of Oreo's & Milk while watching Gilligan's Island! I hope all of my friends can do the same.

Gilligan, I can only think of one thing to say. "Thanks Little Buddy."

Big Scott