DELIA: I think my dad's sick. He talks to himself, to my mom like she's still here. Only that's a problem 'cause she died eight months ago.
IRV: I'm not gonna lie to you, Delia. Sounds like your dad's got a case of something.
DELIA: I knew it.
IRV: But what he has is the one sickness most people spend their whole life trying to catch.
DELIA: What does he have?
IRV: A distraught heart. It's not like other diseases. It can't kill you. Just the opposite, in fact. In most cases, it makes a person feel alive for the first time. Only problem is there's no remedy for it, anywhere in the world.
EPHRAM: He said you were crazy. And, uh, news flash! You are. All right, you quit your job and grow this ugly-ass beard. You look like you wear your clothes and you move us to the middle of Nowheresville, U.S.A.! And why? For what reason? Because someone told you it was pretty once? And if that's not enough, you talk to Mom like she's still here. Yeah, I've seen you and Delia too. So what do I have to say for myself? What do you have to say for yourself?
DR. BROWN: I can't believe you think my beard is ugly.
EPHRAM: Mom never would have done this to us! She never would have moved us here and gone crazy.
DR. BROWN: Don't be so sure about that!
EPHRAM: I am sure! All right? I knew her. You didn't know her. You were never around. We all just tolerated you!
DR. BROWN: Hey, that's pretty good! What else you got?
EPHRAM: I wish you died instead of her!
DR. BROWN: Well, I wish I did too, you little bastard!
EPHRAM: I HATE YOU!
DR. BROWN: Well, I hate you right back! Now get in that house!
DR. BROWN: I want to, uh, apologize for that awful display of parenting techniques. I'm just recently becoming familiar with them.
NINA: Well, the only thing harder than being a parent is a single one.
DR. BROWN: Are you, uh...
NINA: Single? No. I have a husband. A wonderful, funny, and caring man whose only flaw is that he spends eight months a year traveling, selling computer software.
DR. BROWN: You know, my wife was the perfect parent. And that's not just for revisionist history. She really was. Julia knew what to say, what to do, when to talk to them, when to ignore them. Do you know what the foramen magnum is?
NINA: Should I?
DR. BROWN: It's the hole at the base of the skull. Most doctors needed a device to find it. I never did. I could always locate it with my hands. Surgery just came that instinctively to me. Julia was the same way with parenting.
NINA: It has to do with her, doesn't it? Why you came to Everwood.
DR. BROWN: Do you believe that people live on after they die? That their souls are with us?
NINA: Yeah, I do.
DR. BROWN: I need to prove to my wife that I can do this. That I can be the kind of doctor, the kind of father, that she wanted me to be when she was alive. I know it makes me seem nuts. Maybe I am.
NINA: To love someone so much that you're still proving it to them after they die? Well, if that's crazy, Andy, I hope my own insanity isn't that far away.
DR. ABBOTT: Why on Earth would my Amy associate with your misfit?
DR. BROWN: Well, he said something about a crack deal.
DR. BROWN: Do you think it's possible? That a father and son who don't get along can actually have something in common?
EDNA: In my experience, when a father and son don't get along, it usually means they've got everything in common.
DELIA: Is a knapsack country doctorly?
DR. BROWN: Good point, Delia. I need something that says country doctor. I know. An umbrella.
EPHRAM: That says "singing English nanny."
NINA: Oh, it's the Fall Thaw.
DR. BROWN: Excuse me?
NINA: Welcome to one of Everwood's many oddities.
DR. BROWN: It's a Fall Thaw?
NINA: With a legend behind it, no less. Once a year, like clock work, we get a fall heat wave that lasts around a week or so when the town whips up a festival to celebrate it.
DR. BROWN: I gotta stop you before this gets any weirder.
NINA: Oh, you think that's weird? Last week, we got a doctor who doesn't charge anybody.
DR. BROWN: Morning, Doctor. Happy Thaw!
DR. ABBOTT: You're an educated man, Doctor. Surely, you don't plan on succumbing to one of this community's more nonsensical traditions.
DR. BROWN: You gotta admit, it's a balmy day for mid-September.
DR. ABBOTT: The weather pattern we experience at this time of year is a typical Indian summer brought about by a northwesterly flow of the polar jet-stream which, coupled with our unique proximity to the mountains, turn pikes and stagnates the hottest pockets of air directly above our region. And as much as our town enjoys celebrating this anomaly, for those of us who are extra sensitive to the allergens in the air, this is not much of a fun week.
DR. BROWN: As opposed to those other weeks when you just like to party down.
DR. ABBOTT: As usual you make it difficult to hold a civil conversation with you, Doctor.
EDNA: [to Dr. Brown] You're late, and this posse's getting hotter than a hooker's...
DR. BROWN: [cutting her off] ...don't finish that analogy, Edna. I haven't had my coffee yet.
EDNA: Remind me and my tired feet just why it is that you are offering this thankless town free medicine?
DR. BROWN: Long answer is: I spent enough years making enough money off of other peoples' sickness. In order to swage my guilt, I wanted to do something incredibly altruistic. The short answer is: I'm nuts!
AMY: OK. Give it to me.
EPHRAM: Excuse me?
AMY: Your academic update. You've been here a week. What do you think of your classes?
EPHRAM: I think they're as annoying and dull as my classes in New York. Only further west.
AMY: I have to warn you. There's a move to issue the new kid a nickname.
EPHRAM: Why do I not like the direction this conversation is going?
AMY: Don't worry, it's an offensive tactic. The way I see it, at some point, as the new kid, you'll get a nickname. These labels are never kind. They're either fun or mean. Most are mean.
EPHRAM: I know. I have gym with Blackhead Davis.
AMY: See what I mean? Now, if you and I could go through some suggested nicknames, we'll have a real shot of making a fun one stick.
EPHRAM: You know, for the classic girl next door, you have a really warped mind.
AMY: Something in the water here.
EPHRAM: So, what's yours?
AMY: Me? They call me... "Late for class." See you, Bubba!
EPHRAM: Bubba?
AMY: Just testing one out.
BRIGHT: Well howdy, loser!
EPHRAM: You guys choreograph the bathroom stall exit and I'm the loser?
BRIGHT: I see you're still getting cozy with my little sis. I thought I told you once she's spoken for.
EPHRAM: Spoken for? Hey Bright, the fifties called. They want their lingo back.
BRIGHT: As soon as Colin finds out about you, he's gonna kick your sorry ass.
EPHRAM: Well, I figure I might have a slight advantage over him. You know, seeing as I'm conscious.
BRIGHT: Watch what you say, little man. Another comment like that, Colin's not gonna be the only one in a coma.
EPHRAM: You know, statistically, I'm not that little. But according to every chart I've ever seen, you're still a moron.
BRIGHT: Oh, you may think I'm a moron. You may be right. When it comes to my sister Amy, I'm a genius and she's playing you, dude. Soon as she gets your daddy fixing up Colin, she's not even going to be looking at you anymore. Just remember I said that.
DR. ABBOTT: Over my dead and decaying corpse you're going to Thaw Fest with that boy!
AMY: I am not going with him. I'm just meeting him there. And, since when do you care who I go to Thaw Fest with?
DR. ABBOTT: Since you started asking future parolees to attend with you.
AMY: You don't know him! This is so unfair.
DR. ABBOTT: Well in certain parent-child conflicts, fairness is irrelevant.
AMY: Why is it always the parent that always gets to decide the relevancy of fairness?
AMY: Mom, Dad is being EXCRUCIATING!
DR. ABBOTT: Excruciating literally means to feel the pain of crucifixion. While my law may be difficult at times, I think we can both agree that Jesus had it a bit tougher.
AMY: He didn't live here.
EPHRAM: You know, for someone who was once cited by the U.S. News and World Report as one of the greatest minds in America, it amazes me sometimes how clueless you are. You really think this was about a movie?
DR. BROWN: Well, why don't you enlighten me, Ephram, as to what it IS about because that's just what I need tonight. Another lecture from my fifteen-year-old son!
EPHRAM: Do not talk to me the way you used to talk to Mom. I'm not your wife.
DR. BROWN: What the hell is that supposed to mean?
EPHRAM: Do you think I wanna be having this conversation with you? I didn't marry you. I never agreed to pick up your slack!
DR. BROWN: Look, Ephram, I am sorry, I couldn't take care of Delia tonight but I was treating a seven year old boy who could hardly breathe!
EPHRAM: Oh, you win. Seven-year-old boys who can't breathe trump little girls with nightmares.
DR. BROWN: Yes. In my profession, they do!
EPHRAM: In the medical profession or in the crappy father one?
DR. BROWN: RIGHT, THAT IS ENOUGH!!! As of this second, you and that mouth of yours are gonna start showing me some respect or I...
EPHRAM: [holding his hands up revealing a bandage on his right hand] ...Or what?
DR. BROWN: What happened to your hand?
EPHRAM: It's tonight's punch line. I sliced it while trying to pry open a window to this place. Which happened after Delia and I couldn't get a ride home which happened after you left us alone at dinner for the second night this week.
DR. BROWN: Well, let me take a look at it.
EPHRAM: It's fine.
DR. BROWN: Let me just see...
EPHRAM: ...DON'T... touch me!
EPHRAM: [sarcastically] The Great Doctor Brown. That's what Mom and I used to call you. You always thought it was endearing but it wasn't. It was our own private joke. Will The Great Doctor Brown be here for dinner? Will The Great Doctor Brown be joining us this weekend? Don't you see? You're still that guy. You'll always be that guy. It doesn't matter if it's the Dudleys on Forest Lane or some rich lady on Park Avenue, they'll always come first. The only difference is, this time, Mom's not here to cover for you. At least I've got her. Who's Delia get?
EPHRAM: No offense, Amy, but he's really my least favorite thing about you.
BRIGHT: Yeah? Well, you're really my least favorite thing about you.
EPHRAM: Dude, you've really gotta work on the insults.
MISS VIOLET: Your daughter has a mind of her own, Doctor Brown. She repeatedly interrupts my lessons with questions that make very little sense. This in addition to her inappropriate apparel...
DR. BROWN: I've never been to a parent-teacher thingee. Am I allowed to speak?
DELIA: You have to raise your hand.
MISS VIOLET: Excuse me, Doctor Brown!
DR. BROWN: I'm sorry, just out of curiosity Miss Violet, why do the boys sit in front?
MISS VIOLET: Very simple. Boys are rowdier.
DR. BROWN: Rowdier?
MISS VIOLET: They cause more of a fuss. By having them sit in the front, I can monitor their behavior more closely.
DR. BROWN: So, because you think that girls are genetically less rowdy, you relegate them to the back?
MISS VIOLET: The term relegate is...
DR. BROWN: ...entirely appropriate. And as for Delia having a mind of her own, just whose mind is she supposed to have?
MISS VIOLET: I think you misunderstood my point.
DR. BROWN: No, I don't think that I did.
MISS VIOLET: Delia, perhaps you should step outside while your father and I...
DR. BROWN: No, no, no, she got to be here for the bad part. I want her to hear what I'm about to say. Now, my daughter's been through a very traumatic year and she's come through the other side of it remarkably well. I'd like to take more credit for that, but I can't. She's the product of a mother who taught her about strength, courage and independence from an early age. My job is to make sure she doesn't forget those lessons. Now, she will sit wherever you tell her to sit. But as long as she's polite about it, she can ask all the questions she wants. And I'd get used to those baseball caps. And as for you and me? You can keep calling me in here. But next time, my daughter better have really done something wrong or you are going to have one rowdy father on your hands.
NINA: This is not my baby.
BRENDA: Oh, sure. Right. And these aren't my thighs but somehow one morning and had to give up spandex.
NINA: [to everybody] OK! Since when did everybody decide to start tipping eight hundred percent?
NINA: [to Dr. Brown] Can you help me up?
DR. BROWN: You know a pregnant woman...
NINA: [interrupting] What do you know about being pregnant? That's what I thought, please help me up.
NINA: Attention, everyone. I... am not poor. Nor am I a charity case. A year ago, my cousin in Boulder called and asked me if I'd be interested in helping an old friend of hers. And when she explained the situation to me, I-I thought that she was crazy. Then I met her. Her name is Sarah and she's a single woman who teaches comparative religion at the University there. She's unable to carry a child to full term and she desperately wants to have a family. Now, I don't know about you all but I don't believe that single women should be deprived of experiencing motherhood. And if any of you have a problem with me doing this, I invite you to speak now, or forever keep your mouths shut.
NINA: Thank you.
DR. ABBOTT: I-I would like to say a little something if I may. Call your neighbors old-fashioned but some of us don't believe that medical technology should be put to this end. When privileged people play God, design babies, then pay less privileged people to carry them, we are embarking upon a very scary brave new world. And Nina, another thing. If you felt so confident in your decision to do this, why has it taken this long for you to tell all of us about it. We're your neighbors, your friends, your doctor. We have a vested interest in this child that you are carrying and we had a right to know the truth.
DR. BROWN: Can I jump in here?
NINA: Go for it.
DR. BROWN: Hey everyone. Andy Brown here. Crazy doctor who works out of the old train station. Ah, just a word if I may about the moral implications of surrogacy. While I know it's tempting to view certain advancements in reproductive technology as threatening, some of these advancements bring us things like ultrasound and amniocentesis, which allow us to improve the health, and even save the lives of the unborn. Technology cuts both ways. That's why it's important for us to evaluate each case individually. Now, are there ethical questions to be raised? Without a doubt. Does Nina strike any of us as the type of person who would make the decision to help bring life into this world without asking herself those questions? I don't think so. And as for not letting us know sooner, if I knew that I was going to suffer a character assassination from my own doctor in front of half of my friends and neighbors, I'd be inclined to keep a few things to myself too.
WENDELL: This is where the swans rehearse. I was able to call in a favor and give their pianist an acute case of carpal tunnel.
EPHRAM: What?
WENDELL: That's my business, Brown. I trade in favors. In this case, the piano player gets a collector's baseball card and you get a chance to impress Amy.
EPHRAM: And what do you get?
WENDELL: The satisfaction of knowing that I can change people's destinies... and a DVD player. Don't ask. Of course you will have to deal with Miss Baxworth. She's the windbag beneath their wings.
WENDELL: Wet and Wild, is a fantastic Pina Colada flavor. It's like taking a Caribbean cruise every time your lips touch theirs.
EPHRAM: You're making me uncomfortable, Wendell.
EPHRAM: Explain what? Why your friends are total bitches, or why you choose to be friends with them in the first place?
AMY: It's not like they were always like that. I've known them all my life and they didn't start out like that, trust me.
EPHRAM: So, as the bitchiness emerged, you chose to ignore it and follow along. Not unlike the Nazis.
AMY: Not everyone's a loner, Ephram. Some people actually like having friends, even if they're difficult at times.
EPHRAM: You prefer quantity over quality? That's your problem.
AMY: Look, I don't agree with what they did. But maybe if you weren't scowling all the time, people wouldn't feel the need to dis-invite you places.
EPHRAM: You're right. It's my fault. I should take up football and cow tipping. Then your friends would like me and I'd be the most popular boy in the whole school!
DELIA: At first, I let him take stuff 'cause I thought he'd be my friend. But now, he just takes whatever he wants.
DR. BROWN: Honey, just because you want people to like you, it doesn't mean you have to give everything away.
EDNA: You know, the only time you remind me of your father is when you've got a sour puss on. Spill it, Grover.
AMY: My friends. They basically pulled a Heathers on me.
EDNA: Mmm, I see. No, I don't. What does that mean?
AMY: They un-invited a friend of mine to their party because they don't think he's popular enough and when I tried to talk to him about it and explain everything, he, he blew up at me.
EDNA: Well, his feelings were hurt. That's normal, don't you think?
AMY: I didn't wanna hurt him. But they've been my friends since second grade. What was I supposed to do?
EDNA: It's not easy to care about someone when the whole world is telling you not to. You have to live your own life, Amy. Trust your instincts. They're pretty good.
AMY: Must be my genes.
EDNA: That, and a bladder like a yak.
AMY: So I heard you were like Mr. Midwife last night.
EPHRAM: Well, I prefer junior resident. It was pretty cool.
AMY: Nina was lucky to have you guys there.
EPHRAM: It was mostly my dad. I basically supplied the shoelace. You know, to cut the cord. So, how was the party?
AMY: I think you know why. You scare me, Ephram.
EPHRAM: Well, that doesn't sound good.
AMY: No no, I think it is. When you first got here, I know I got to know you for all the wrong reasons. Friendship wasn't exactly at the top of my list. But, as it turns out, you're really funny and weird and now you're like this guy in my life that I care about. Does that make any sense?
EPHRAM: Define "weird".
AMY: I think you just need to cut me some slack once in a while.
EPHRAM: Define "slack".
EPHRAM: I don't know how she did it. I don't know how anyone could just hand over a baby.
DR. BROWN: I think the issue's more focused on someone else's gain, not her loss.
EPHRAM: Still. I don't envy that kid.
DR. BROWN: Why?
EPHRAM: Well, think about it. When he's 10, his mother's a senior citizen. When he's 15, she's like, what? 70? One slip in the tub, she breaks her hip. Could be dead before he graduates high school.
DR. BROWN: You're right. Then again, she may live to be a hundred. Maybe that kid will be luckier than you.
DR. BROWN: OK then. It looks like you may have contracted an STD, Susie.
MRS. CLARK: A what?
DR. BROWN: A sexually transmitted disease.
SUSIE: But, how is that possible? I've never even had sex. I'm, like, a total virgin.
DR. BROWN: Are you sure?
MRS. CLARK: Of course, she's sure. Good Lord, what kind of question is that?
DR. BROWN: Well, as her doctor, it's what I have to ask. I don't mean to make anyone feel uncomfortable.
MRS. CLARK: Well, I believe she answered your question. She's never had sex. She's a virgin.
DR. BROWN: Well, I-I hate to hint back, Mrs. Clark, but ah I still have a diagnosis which contends that your daughter has in fact engaged in some sort of sexual activity.
SUSIE: Well, I've never done anything that can get me pregnant. And, that's what sex is, right, Mom?
EDNA: I never would've thought little Susie Clark had it in her. It's always the quiet ones.
DR. BROWN: That's the second girl I've seen this week and with the same misguided information. It's as if they've never even heard the term: safe sex.
EDNA: The most education these kids get about sex is how to spell it. Some of 'em can't even do that right.
DR. BROWN: Any idea what the schools are teaching?
EDNA: I'm not sure. But whatever they don't cover, HBO does.
DR. BROWN: In their minds, a sexually transmitted disease can only be transmitted via sex. And in their minds, sex is...
DR. ABBOTT: [starting to get it] ...intercourse.
DR. ABBOTT: The people in this town need to be educated about a lot of things, including how to parallel park. Luckily... I'm not here to teach them. Neither are you.
DR. BROWN: Isn't part of being a doctor, teaching people how to avoid getting sick? Especially young people?
EPHRAM: I guess I underestimated you, dude. I thought you'd at least come up with a new way of messing with me.
BRIGHT: Oh, why bother dude. You keep falling for the same joke, man.
DR. ABBOTT: There are no vaccines for gonorrhea.
DR. BROWN: Nor are there any for Chlamydia, Syphilis or HIV. What we can do is educate our children, which is the best preventative medicine I know of.
DR. BROWN: Yes, I'm aware of the program. It teaches abstinence only. It's antiquated and it doesn't provide nearly enough information.
MALE: What are you suggesting, Doctor? We hand out condoms in homeroom?
IRV: Your husband. And the last time I checked, it was well within a husband's right to try to cheer up his grouch of a wife.
EDNA: In the first place, if I needed cheering up, I would rent Terminator like I always do. Second, I don't give a damn about that old bridge.
DR. BROWN: Look, Ephram I think you're being just a little bit melodramatic. It's not like I'm trying to ruin your life.
EPHRAM: You don't have to try. You do it pretty naturally.
DR. BROWN: What is it that I'm doing that's so terrible?
EPHRAM: Everyone in school is gonna be going around saying how Dr. Brown is a big sex expert and how his loser son can't even get a date to the stupid dance.
DR. BROWN: Ephram, when I was in neurosurgery, I could never help people before they got sick, I couldn't prevent their sickness. I can do that now.
EPHRAM: So, if you miss this assembly, kids all over town are gonna drop dead from having unsafe sex? Well, it's a good thing you're there for them, Dr. Brown. Maybe, one day, I'll find out what it's like for you to be here for me.
DR. BROWN: (CONT'D) When I was first working in New York, I had to perform a lumbar puncture, it's basically a spinal tap, on this kid who'd been brought in. Couldn't have been more than 17 years old. Good looking, clean cut, well to do family. His name was Alfie. I remember that because it was so unusual. Anyway, I did the LP, assessed that there was no meningitis and went about my rounds. But I couldn't stop thinking about Alfie all night. I found out later that the doctors were performing all sort of tests. A couple of days later, I went back to Alfie's room just to check him out. Thinking maybe I could figure out what he had. But Alfie was already dead. 17 years old. Six months and thousands of Alfies later, his sickness finally got a name.
EPHRAM: AIDS.
DR. BROWN: I needed you to know why I had to come to your school, Ephram. I needed you to hear that story because I want you always to be careful. I can't afford to lose another person I love.
EPHRAM: Why didn't you tell me that before?
DR. BROWN: I have no idea how to get your attention, Ephram.
EPHRAM: What's that supposed to mean?
DR. BROWN: It means, I don't know what to say to you. One day you seem to hate me. The next day you still hate me and other days you just... hate me. I mean, that's not a lot to work with. So if you could maybe let me know when I do say the right thing, I'll make a note of it, and I'll do it more often, OK?
AMY: He yells, I apologize, there's a sentencing of some sort and then I plea bargain with my mother until the sentence gets reduced.
EPHRAM: In my house it's more like: I yell, he yells, we both keep yelling, and eventually someone gets tired.
DR. ABBOTT: You just earned yourself an 8 percent increase in allowance. Even though you did manage to make my surgery rotation sound like a dalliance. I only wish I could be there to see the look on that nut's face when he reads this tonight.
AMY: Who? Doctor Brown? You so have a boy crush on him.
DR. ABBOTT: My issue with Dr. Brown is neither flirtation nor rivalry. It is a crusade to protect both him and this town from the potentially lethal results of his dementia. And I loathe him.
DR. ABBOTT: Gretchen, is it my imagination or did we not discuss, in detail, at the time of your last visit oh when was that? Easter? The desirability of your finding a more convenient place to see patients.
DR. TROTT: Well, I believe you did make certain views known. I might call it a rumination more than a conversation.
DR. ABBOTT: Well... whether you remember it or not, you need to move this eyesore so that I can park my car in my regular space.
DR. TROTT: Well I believe that this is the most convenient location for most of my patients, so in the absence of any official signage, I think I'll continue to station myself here.
DR. ABBOTT: Did you hear a word I just said?
DR. TROTT: I heard you use territorialism to establish superiority. While I can respect a narcissistic impulse, I'm under no obligation to cater to it.
DR. BROWN: I don't believe we've met, Dr. Trott. I'm Andy Brown.
DR. ABBOTT: [snarky] Speaking of narcissists.
DR. TROTT: THE Andy Brown?
DR. BROWN: The one and only.
DR. TROTT: [fumbling] Well, i-it's a pleasure to meet you. I'm, well... I'm actually a bit of a fan. I recently rediscovered your '97 article on distinguishing psychological from organic mental disorders. I have to tell you, I found your analysis even more insightful upon second reading.
DR. BROWN: Let me just say it's a pleasure to meet a person who's providing such a valuable service to this community and I would be delighted to park my car down the street for the duration of your stay.
DR. TROTT: Oh, well, thank you. Thank you very much. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to prepare to see my patients.
DR. ABBOTT: You thrive on it, the insecurity, the doubt, the self loathing. You come into town every few months, needlessly stir up neuroses like lawn mowing in the dust ball.
DR. TROTT: I don't create the feelings, I just give people a safe place to put them.
DR. ABBOTT: You ride into town like Joan of Arc of gestalt, a week later your patients are reassurance junkies begging for a fix, and you've ridden off in the sunset while someone has to pick up the pieces.
DR. TROTT: How does that make you feel, Harold?
DR. ABBOTT: [getting up] Do shrinks have that implanted on a chip somewhere? Memorize a few key phrases, buy a couch, you're Sigmund Freud?
DR. TROTT: While I respect your point of view, and I'm glad you feel comfortable discussing it...
DR. ABBOTT: [interrupting] You ever actually say something? For God's sake, get to the point!
DR. TROTT: Is it possible that in reality, *you* thrive on it? That you derive satisfaction from, and I'm using your words, "picking up the pieces"?
DR. ABBOTT: Don't make me out to be some type of parasitic, misery loving, ego maniac.
DR. TROTT: [getting her sandwich] Those are your terms, not mine. Try to stay evidence based, Harold. Don't be so hard on yourself. [walking out] Thanks for the sandwich, Dwayne.
DR. TROTT: A glib response is somewhat wasted on a psychotherapist.
DR. BROWN: Well, people keep asking me and it gets kind of old. As if every act of altruism required a rationale.
DR. TROTT: Altruism?
DR. BROWN: Yeah, you know, like... oh I get it, I get it. A memorized psyche rotation. You think I've got some kind of sub-conscious motivator like... winning friends and influencing people or ah, well go ahead. Give it your best shot.
DR. TROTT: I just wonder what it means when a world-renown neurosurgeon with a better than average shot of making the history books, moves to the middle of nowhere and gives his most precious resource away for free.
DR. BROWN: And you won't be buying a football team anytime soon? You got me, Doc. I don't think about those kinds of things. I guess some people are just too hard-headed for that kind of complexity.
DR. TROTT: I believe that the average level of neurosis in non-mentally ill individuals is strikingly similar. It's the spectrum of self-awareness that differs. I call it the Denial Factor.
DR. BROWN: Well, I get a certain perverse pleasure out of solving my own problems.
DR. TROTT: Everyone needs someone.
DR. BROWN: So lay it on me. What does happen to those unfortunate individuals who deny their own neurosis?
DR. TROTT: The effects vary, of course. In extreme cases, the pattern can be something along the lines of complete emotional spirals, resulting in total breakdown.
DR. BROWN: You don't say.
EDNA: [interrupting] As Dr. Sourpuss's nurse, I was privy to some information which I normally wouldn't disclose but, under the circumstances... It's about little Stuart, Magilla. He wasn't born a "he". Not a "she" neither exactly. Ambiguous genitalia. What some in the profession call, pseudo-hermaphrodite.
DR. BROWN: This is the gorilla kid? The one who put a bug up his own nose?
EDNA: The parents see right off they're in the deep serious in this one and they send him to a specialist in Denver. This "genius" follows the prevailing wisdom and suggests that since baby Magilla's got a fairly well formed "you know what", and generally looks masculine, the parents should rear him as a boy, no questions asked. And... Delia comes along and they see their boy playing with a girl, playing like a girl.
DR. BROWN: Well... the situation will only become more complicated as he approaches puberty. I should probably talk to them about something...
EDNA: [shaking her head] You can talk till you're blue in the face, Doc. It's not gonna change this family's ideas on how to raise their child.
EPHRAM: Amy matters to me. And as pathetic as it may be, you were her only shot. She's not used to being let down by you. Not yet.
DR. BROWN: Listen to me, Ephram. These people asked me what I would do if it were my son and I told them that I thought it was risky. It's tempting to leap in and try and surgically fix things.
EPHRAM: That's a load! You know it. If it were your son? If it were me? You'd let me sit there in a coma when there was a zillionth of a percent chance you could ride in there on your white horse and save me? I don't think so. If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were scared. We're gonna be late
DR. ABBOTT: Love what you've done with the place.
DR. BROWN: Well, wood sounding, table paper, some tongue depressors... the sky's the limit.
DR. ABBOTT: I find it's more convenient to store extra swabs under the table.
DR. BROWN: Did you really come into my office for the first time since I've been here, to tell me where you store your swabs?
DR. ABBOTT: The first day you came here, you thought you recognized me.
DR. BROWN: Yeah, you said it was from the mental ward.
DR. ABBOTT: [laughing] Yeah, that was a good one. |
DR. ABBOTT: You did recognize me. I was finishing up at the VA when you got there. Oh, there's no reason you should remember me. *You* were harder to miss. Even then, we all knew we were in the presence of something greater than ourselves. It was like being on the junior high basketball team with Michael Jordan. The chief would describe each new feat of yours with unmitigated jealousy, almost hatred.
DR. BROWN: Gee. I always though Doug liked me.
DR. ABBOTT: Oh, he hated you. You brought him face to face with his worst fear. That he would "never" be extraordinary. He met you, he abandoned his dreams of greatness. He wasn't alone.
DR. BROWN: So, you were going to be...
DR. ABBOTT: A surgeon? Yes. I was almost a surgeon. Unfortunately, I, I discovered I didn't have the hands for it. So after my residency I just... came back here, joined my father's practice in this... miserable little town. I became a family doctor. No small thing in times like these. But you... You are a man with a gift much larger than yourself, larger even than your own hopelessly bloated ego, if that's possible.
DR. BROWN: [sarcastically] Thank you.
DR. ABBOTT: Sharon and James Hart don't know who you are. I do. I do. They don't know what you can do for their son, they're terrified of making a mistake. I know and you know somewhere within the world's thickest dura, you owe it to this kid to perform whatever miracle you've got up your sleeve. You owe it to Colin and to his parents and to my [a beat, getting teary] poor heartbroken daughter and to the universe or whoever decided that you would be Leonardo and I would be... less remarkable. Hell, you owe it to me!
AMY: I remember in fourth grade Miss Kisslinger's class and Miss Barber's class went on a field trip to the brewery. And on the way back home, I got into the wrong bus. Colin thought they had left me behind. He walked back three miles and stayed at the brewery till night fall, trying to find me. Couldn't leave me behind. What were you playing before?
EPHRAM: You said nobody brought you flowers but come on, it would've been your first solo, so... I wanted to make sure someone remembered. I wrote you a song.
AMY: If I ask you a girl question, do you promise not to laugh?
COLIN: No.
AMY: Haha. What were you just thinking then? Just then, you had this look.
COLIN: I was just thinking about the fireworks that we saw earlier in Mr. Nole's driveway. The ones that are shooting off tonight. They must have cost a fortune.
AMY: Oh.
COLIN: Oh, look, I can't think about you every second of every day, Grover. I mean, sometimes I gotta take time to think about normal guy things like, trucks, electronics... Katie Holmes.
AMY: I get the idea.
COLIN: All right, maybe it wasn't just the fireworks.
AMY: Go on.
COLIN: I was just thinking about us watching them go off last year.
AMY: And?
COLIN: I just hoped that it would, keep going. With your hand touching mine, just like that. Then, it was over.
SHARON: I need something. Colin made a mistake when he drove that day and he paid a horrible price. I just don't want to be responsible for making him worse.
DR. BROWN: Mrs. Hart, Colin's been in a coma for over four months. That's well beyond the time frame where a meaningful recovery is likely. The only assurance I can give you is this: In my career, I've performed over twenty-six hundred surgeries. And I have never had one, where I cared more about the outcome.
EPHRAM: You let a guy who's never been out of New York City drive a car in the wilderness.
DR. BROWN: He's your Uncle Brian not Woody Allen.
EPHRAM: You know, for a while I was upset because I just missed New York.....now I can finally know true despair.
BRIAN: Despair's right up your alley. You're a musician.
BRIGHT: You know, there's a reason men don't wear ruffles.
COLIN: It's not that bad. If this were 1775, you'd be a total chick magnet.
BRIGHT: Yeah, he's the axis of evil, I know.
DR. ABBOTT: Yes, he is. But he's also an unbelievable surgeon. In fact, if he wasn't so annoying in every single aspect of his existence, I'd say we were lucky to have him in this town.
BRIGHT: What's your point?
DR. ABBOTT: Bright, my point is, Colin is in good hands....
BRIGHT: No! I don't want to talk about Colin!
DR. ABBOTT: I understand....
BRIGHT: You don't understand! Just forget it. I will be back in a few hours.
DR. ABBOTT: Lord. Help me! Your mother is out there kissing babies like it's Election Day, your brother's missing in action, and I cannot seem to locate the orchestra's conductor. We need to establish a signal so that these people know when to start playing! The timing is crucial!
AMY: Dad! It's not an orchestra! It's the school band. And your conductor is Mr. Mendick who's inhaling a corndog over there.
COLIN: I am sorry for whatever I did that pissed you off. It was because of earlier. When you said what you said to me at Buck's Rock, and I didn't say what I should have said back.
AMY: You didn't have to say anything back. I was just hurt that you didn't.
COLIN: Oh, don't take it the wrong way.
AMY: How am I supposed to take it, Colin? It's the first time I've ever... it's the first time I've ever said that to someone I wasn't related to.
COLIN: It just took me by surprise. That's all.
AMY: Me too.
COLIN: You are the longest relationship I have ever had, Amy. You're my girl. You want to go watch the fireworks together later?
AMY: I guess, I gotta go.
COLIN: Aren't you going to kiss me goodbye?
AMY: I'm late.
EPHRAM: Like, I think she's amazing and beautiful, completely out of my league. She agrees. I mean, if she wanted me at the hospital, she could have asked me.
NINA: Could she have? If going to the hospital is something you think you can handle, then go. 'Cause chances are Ephram, she probably really wants you there, she just doesn't feel like she has the right to ask you. If you don't want to go, that's OK too, you don't have to be the best friend that helps her get through this. You just have to decide what kind of friend you want to be.
EPHRAM: You know, I forgot how good women are at this stuff.
COLIN: Besides, your brother there is still the kid who threw up on the DMV guy during his driving test.
DR. ABBOTT: Bright, what is it?
BRIGHT: I remember everything. About last Fourth of July, I remember everything that happened that day.
DR. ABBOTT: Well, that's natural. It's been a while. Immediate effects of the trauma.....
BRIGHT: I always have.
DR. ABBOTT: Go on.
BRIGHT: That afternoon, he stole some stuff from his dad's liquor cabinet. Colin. We were drinking. Before I know it, the ceremony is over and these guys are going to go off roading. The truck was there and I knew we shouldn't have taken it. We get up to Miller's Field, and he says I could drive.
DR. ABBOTT: No, wait wait wait, slow down son, you're not making any sense.
BRIGHT: It was me dad, I was driving the truck when the accident happened. Not Colin.
DR. ABBOTT: Sergeant Dan Forth said....
BRIGHT: No, he assumed that where Colin's body landed that he was driving, and I let him think it.
DR. ABBOTT: And you were drinking too?
BRIGHT: Yeah. I was. See it was my fault, and if Colin dies, it's going to be like I killed him. Like I killed my best friend. I wanted to tell you when it happened and I should have told you. I should have told you, Dad. I'm so sorry. Amy's going to hate me forever.
JAMES: No no, I just want to understand this. Four months, after all's been said and done, I find out Colin wasn't driving? I don't get it...what does it mean?
SHARON: It means he wasn't driving. That's all. He was still in the truck. He still got hurt. It doesn't change anything.
JAMES: No, you're wrong. It has to, something has to change.
DR. ABBOTT: Jim, you have every reason to be upset. Bright just wants to make things right. We both do.
JAMES: And how's that? How can things be made right when Colin is like he is?
DR. ABBOTT: I don't know... I... The truth is... This is the... Just a first step.
JAMES: That shouldn't be my son in there.
BRIGHT: I know I did a horrible thing. I'm so sorry.
SHARON: Bright, to my knowledge, you're the first person to take any responsibility for what happened that day.
BRIGHT: I should have said something sooner.
SHARON: I could say that same thing about myself. I haven't been able to bring myself to be able to say those words.
BRIGHT: You weren't there......
SHARON: I did not know my son was drinking or that he took the truck keys. When I look back at that day, I think... I think that I knew.
BRIGHT: I miss him.
SHARON: Me too. Will you wait here with us?
BRIGHT: Yeah.
EPHRAM: It's official, I have run out of things to say. [a beat] I'm really not this boring, it's just rare that I spend so much time with one person, you know I usually scrap the bottom of the barrel. Most of the time I get in, I get out, nobody gets hurt.
AMY: It's not you. It's just this whole day is starting to feel longer than the four months Colin's been in a coma.
EPHRAM: Yeah. Four months...
AMY: We had a fight that day. Before he took the truck. A big fight. I told him I loved him.
EPHRAM: You guys have a weird way of fighting.
AMY: He didn't say it back.
EPHRAM: Maybe...he was just having a hard time with the words. You know, sometimes people really want to say something, but, you just can't.
AMY: Maybe. Maybe he never really loved me. And do you know what the worst part is? Worse than the waiting and the operation, the tubes and the machines? Sometimes I think he wasn't just going for a joy ride that day. I think he was running away from me.
EPHRAM: Amy... OK, this is going to sound really lame, but, it's the truth. I know how you feel. For a long time after my mom had her accident, I was sure it was my fault. Blaming yourself, it's just a way to try and make sense of something that will never make sense. When the truth is, it was what it was. An accident.
AMY: Kind of amazing, isn't it? Out of all the people I've known my whole life, you're the only one who showed up today.
BRIAN: You're right about one thing though. You're a different person. You're better than you were before.
DR. BROWN: It was the knishes. And for the fact that the first time in my life, I had a personal stake in the outcome.
BRIAN: Whatever it was, I want you to put it in a carry-on bag and come back to New York with me.
DR. BROWN: Sorry, no can do.
BRIAN: Hey, it doesn't have to be today. If you finish this sabbatical, come back home. We still need the guy that can fix God's mistakes.
DR. BROWN: This is my home now, Brian. And as for the big guy's mistakes, these days I'm working on one of his bigger ones. And it ain't the fact that you'll never be as pretty as me!
REV. KEYES: [slightly embarrassed] The fact of the matter is... this doesn't generally happen. That is, that is to say that... this only seems to happen when the wife and I... You know, when we're intimate.
SALLY: He means on the rare occasion when we attempt to get it on like the other morning before he left for the service.
REV. KEYES: Good Lord, Sally, you don't need to spell it out for him.
SALLY: It's not like the mission was accomplished.
DR. BROWN: So you think his allergic reactions are actually psychosomatic?
SALLY: I think they're just plain psycho. Most men I know would be thrilled if their wives tried to look nice for them. [getting up] Do you know, for the first time in forever, I can wear short skirts without my thighs brushing up against each other?
DR. BROWN: Yes. Well...
SALLY: I'm on a very high protein diet. All I eat is chicken. Steamed chicken, baked chicken, skinless chicken, boneless chicken. I've lost 35 pounds, [leaning over his desk] I exfoliate every night and do a four mile jog every morning and I feel great, Dr. Brown. Don't I look great?
DR. BROWN: [lost for words] You look... great.
SALLY: But he doesn't care. I'm finally happy and all he wants is for me to go back to being his stuffy old reverend's wife that I was before but that's not who I am inside. We went to see Dr. Trott for marriage counseling the last time she rolled through town.
DR. BROWN: Dr. Trott? Really? How did that go?
SALLY: She said our emotional paths had diverged. I don't know what she meant but I know that's not good. My mother thinks I should leave him.
DR. BROWN: Well, that seems a little hasty, Mrs. Keyes.
SALLY: Fifteen years of marriage should get complacent. It's easy to forget who you are-you were. You know, a little while ago, something inside of me snapped. It's like I woke up and I saw my life going on without me and I had to do something about it. I want to live my life, Dr. Brown. I wanna feel it. Don't you wanna feel you live?
DR. BROWN: [mesmerized by the thought] Sometimes.
SALLY: Were you married a long time?
DR. BROWN: It would've been twenty years today.
SALLY: I bet you never took her for granted.
DR. BROWN: I wouldn't take that bet.
DR. ABBOTT: Life is too short, Rose. I'm getting too old for frivolous pursuits.
ROSE: Frivolous pursuits. Like ironing your shirts? Making your bed? Raising our children, sweeping out the garage? I love our life, Harold. But I do not love cleaning toilets. This is time I take out of my life because I love you. Time when I could be reading or painting or gardening or seeing the world. This is what I give up. This is what I give of myself to make our marriage work. Now what do you give up for me?
REV. KEYES: So let's forget it. You and I can sleep in separate bedrooms from now on.
SALLY: Is that a threat or a promise?
SALLY: We talked about life a-and love and passion and how some people actually have it, Tom. Dr. Brown doesn't think I'm crazy. He thinks I'm beautiful, don't you, Dr. Brown? See! Other men actually men actually want to have sex with me. They don't go breaking into hives at the thought of it.
REV. KEYES: Those men don't have to live with you. They don't have to watch you starving yourself on nothing but chicken breasts day in and day out, piling all that junk on your face trying to look like somebody you're never gonna look like anyway! Maybe if you spent less time on yourself and a little more time on the important things in life...
SALLY: Like being your wife? [to Dr. Brown] Do you see what I'm dealing with here?
DR. BROWN: You could run out of those, you know.
DR. ABBOTT: Run out of what?
DR. BROWN: Next summers. I know you think I left my sanity back in New York, Harold.
DR. ABBOTT: Perhaps you should go back and locate it.
DR. BROWN: But I can tell you this much: If you're lucky enough to meet the right woman, and she's stupid enough to fall in love with you, you hang on to her like a son of a bitch.
EPHRAM: [yelling] Don't you ever think before you open your stupid mouth?
TODD: Who are you, the coma police?
EPHRAM: Are you really that much of a dumb ass? DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT IT'S LIKE TO LOSE SOMEBODY?
EPHRAM: Imagine working down here. Spending whole days without ever seeing the sun.
AMY: It's like I've been living down here for the past four and a half months. I can't even remember what my life was like before. Like every second is about turning back time. Convincing Colin's parents that he should have the surgery, convincing your dad that he was the best one to do it. Now the surgery's over, Colin's still lying in the bed and I can't convince myself that any of it was worth it.
EPHRAM: It was.
AMY: Now even my friends look at me like I'm pathetic like I'm just sitting around waiting for some sort of...
EPHRAM: ...Miracle? You should. I hear they happen every once in a while.
EPHRAM: If he suddenly wakes up tomorrow, you and I will become total strangers?
AMY: Strangers? Ephram, I've shared more with you in the past couple of months than I've shared with anybody in my whole life.
DR. BROWN: So you think his allergic reactions are actually psychosomatic?
SALLY: I think they're just plain psycho. Most men I know would be thrilled if their wives tried to look nice for them. [getting up] Do you know, for the first time in forever, I can wear short skirts without my thighs brushing up against each other?
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Everwood: Minor Characters
MR. GREELEY: Stay out of this, Doctor "I can't diagnose you without an appointment."
MRS. DUDLEY: I heard about what happened yesterday. And I wanted to tell you that my family, well, like a lot of other families around here, we don't have much. But, now we have a doctor. I know it was a tragedy that brought you here sir, for that I am truly sorry. But, I'm not sorry you came.
WENDELL: You could always get calf implants. There's a doctor down in Denver who, evidently, works miracles on men with chicken legs.
WENDELL: If you want to get your picture up in her locker, you're going about it all wrong, dude. The whole school knows that Amy worships at the shrine of coma boy every weekend. If you want to break her of the habit, you're gonna need help.
WENDELL: I provide a service. One you might find infinitely beneficial in your doomed albeit noble romantic pursuits.
WALTER: You? No. Edna, yes. We went steady in the fifth grade. She introduced me to hickies and shoplifting.
WALTER: It's a little slice of heaven.
MAGILLA: What did you call me? Say it again and I'll fry your face in fat.
MARTHA: If God wanted fifty-five year old women to have babies, he would've given us lifetime warranties on our "you know what's".
PATRON: That's gotta be a New York City dog. Out here, a dog knows he's a dog.
WENDELL: It's probably not that exciting anyway. It looks exciting because of all the wild gesticulating and massive hair flippage that's going on? You'd think they were solving the world's energy crisis, or better yet... revealing their secret crushes. That's what they want us to think. My guess is, they're debating which lip gloss has the best flavor.
KAYLA: OK, whatever. The point is, is that he's not gonna fit at my party, is he? And then I'm gonna feel all lame like I'm having a loser party because Eddie Munster isn't having any fun. And it's my birthday. I shouldn't have to worry that other people aren't having any fun. Except, you know, us.
PAGE: So if you don't 'like him' like him, then he won't care if we un-invite him.
PAGE: Would we ever do something mean to someone's face?
PAGE: Here's the thing. We totally want you to come to Kayla's party, but...
KAYLA: Yeah, but my mom said I could only invite tall people.
JOE: You're not supposed to fall through a bridge.
WENDELL: See, the Fall Dance is special in that it's one of the dances where the girls ask the boys and the way they ask, it's sort of a tradition around here. Once the girls have chosen an item, they tie a ribbon around it, sign their names to it, and place it on your locker as a way of formally inviting you. Check your lock.
MAGILLA: It's like Santa. They just tell kids about God to get them to go to bed on time or stop picking their scabs.
ARNIE: My dad said you can't prove there's a God. You just have to have faith.
MISS VIOLET: Way back in something-something before Christ, who your people don't believe in anyway, the Hebrews were chased out of their land... again. But when they got back, there was only enough oil to light their lamp for one day. They said 'to the heck with it' and used it all up. But it turned out the oil that was only enough for one day, lasted eight whole days. Now if you don't mind, those pine bells aren't gonna glitter themselves.
DAVENPORT: Doc. You of all people should understand. It was your idea to take my obsessive compulsive disorder and turn it into something useful. Now, thanks to you and the Pinecone, I'm a productive member of Everwood society for fifteen years. Practically saved my life.
DAVENPORT: You see that gear? That's me. I'm the gear that has to spin. And neither the serotonin reuptake inhibitors, nor the man that prescribes them, can stop that. Everyone has something they have to do. I have to put out a paper, you need your article tomorrow.
ROTH: Yes Sir! There are three essential proofs for the existence of an omnipotent benevolent deity, Sir! The primary is that the monotheist cosmological proof in which the Aristotelian causal argument is applied. This is seconded in the madrastic law, in the story of the patriarch, Abraham, gazing at the stars. He equates the night sky to a sumptuous castle found in a field. Taking in its intricacies, one must assume the castle had a builder...
LOUISE: Then, I'd appreciate it if you'd say "could you please have the folders redone by Friday, Louise?" And further more, I was not hired to make coffee. So... if I choose to do so, it will be on a case by case, personal favor basis. Is that understood?
LOUISE: You're the one who told me my lack of assertiveness was limiting my career potential.
WOMAN: I'm a person and I'm important.
DR. TROTT: Welcome to the human race, Dr. Brown.
BRIAN: Ahh, gentlemen, and lady, worship me! For I have brought unto you, New York City!
BRIAN: He wants to be you. Hell, I wouldn't mind being you. Minus the beard.
BRIAN: Like, there's any order of difficulty in the miracles you've performed?
BRIAN: Before you took me under your wing, Andy, I never believed there were people put on this earth simply to fix God's mistakes. That's the sort of gift that doesn't goes away. Sleep easy, Dr. Brown. You're going to be great.
BRIAN: I still got time for a tickle-sectomy!
KAYLA: Because I wear deodorant, unlike some people.
SALLY: Oh, it's not the waiting. It's just that I don't think my husband's allergic to anything that's on your desk. He's allergic to me. He doesn't like all the changes I've made to myself over the last few months so he's decided to go get warts.
REV. KEYES: There's my little ego booster. Glad I'm over here getting pricked to death just so I can kiss you again.
TODD: This is Colin Hart's nurse. I just wanted to call and let you know your boyfriend's doing really well. He's sitting up right now singing the greatest hits of N'Sync.
SALLY: I suppose it must look that way to you. But, it feels like the decision was taken out of our hands. Somewhere down the line Tom and I grew apart. We started wanting different things and we can't go back even if we wanted to. Sometimes we wish we could. 'Cause to tell you the truth, I'm scared out of my mind right now. I'll see you around, Doctor.
REV. KEYES: The gift of community is that each one of us is absolved of the burden of completeness. And in of ourselves that every moment we can lean on one another for the elements we lack. This week I leaned on one of you for this week I lost my marriage. When you join your life with someone, you plan your future. Isn't that truly the definition of hope? To look into the future and imagine a better moment. A glimmer of beauty to strive for. This week I lost all that. At the moment when I was without reason, when I no longer could find meaning of my own, I came here to this church. I believed as I have at other moments of need that I would find God here. I did not. What I found inside this church was a man more dispirited than myself. Crying out to our Lord and seeking comfort in receiving none. I say to this man today, I cannot fix your broken heart. I cannot mend your weakened spirit. What I can do is pour the love of this community into your wound. As your own faith was a healing sieve unto my own. Each year, I select a member of this community who represents the value of hope. This year, I would like to single out a man who is most deserving of our own. Of this community's light and life. That man is Dr. Andrew Brown. There are two states in this life. Love and a call for love. It is the latter which is most requiring of bravery. Come together as a community and help this courageous man find what he came here to seek... peace, joy, hope... for us all.
MRS. DUDLEY: I heard about what happened yesterday. And I wanted to tell you that my family, well, like a lot of other families around here, we don't have much. But, now we have a doctor. I know it was a tragedy that brought you here sir, for that I am truly sorry. But, I'm not sorry you came.
WENDELL: You could always get calf implants. There's a doctor down in Denver who, evidently, works miracles on men with chicken legs.
WENDELL: If you want to get your picture up in her locker, you're going about it all wrong, dude. The whole school knows that Amy worships at the shrine of coma boy every weekend. If you want to break her of the habit, you're gonna need help.
WENDELL: I provide a service. One you might find infinitely beneficial in your doomed albeit noble romantic pursuits.
WALTER: You? No. Edna, yes. We went steady in the fifth grade. She introduced me to hickies and shoplifting.
WALTER: It's a little slice of heaven.
MAGILLA: What did you call me? Say it again and I'll fry your face in fat.
MARTHA: If God wanted fifty-five year old women to have babies, he would've given us lifetime warranties on our "you know what's".
PATRON: That's gotta be a New York City dog. Out here, a dog knows he's a dog.
WENDELL: It's probably not that exciting anyway. It looks exciting because of all the wild gesticulating and massive hair flippage that's going on? You'd think they were solving the world's energy crisis, or better yet... revealing their secret crushes. That's what they want us to think. My guess is, they're debating which lip gloss has the best flavor.
KAYLA: OK, whatever. The point is, is that he's not gonna fit at my party, is he? And then I'm gonna feel all lame like I'm having a loser party because Eddie Munster isn't having any fun. And it's my birthday. I shouldn't have to worry that other people aren't having any fun. Except, you know, us.
PAGE: So if you don't 'like him' like him, then he won't care if we un-invite him.
PAGE: Would we ever do something mean to someone's face?
PAGE: Here's the thing. We totally want you to come to Kayla's party, but...
KAYLA: Yeah, but my mom said I could only invite tall people.
JOE: You're not supposed to fall through a bridge.
WENDELL: See, the Fall Dance is special in that it's one of the dances where the girls ask the boys and the way they ask, it's sort of a tradition around here. Once the girls have chosen an item, they tie a ribbon around it, sign their names to it, and place it on your locker as a way of formally inviting you. Check your lock.
MAGILLA: It's like Santa. They just tell kids about God to get them to go to bed on time or stop picking their scabs.
ARNIE: My dad said you can't prove there's a God. You just have to have faith.
MISS VIOLET: Way back in something-something before Christ, who your people don't believe in anyway, the Hebrews were chased out of their land... again. But when they got back, there was only enough oil to light their lamp for one day. They said 'to the heck with it' and used it all up. But it turned out the oil that was only enough for one day, lasted eight whole days. Now if you don't mind, those pine bells aren't gonna glitter themselves.
DAVENPORT: Doc. You of all people should understand. It was your idea to take my obsessive compulsive disorder and turn it into something useful. Now, thanks to you and the Pinecone, I'm a productive member of Everwood society for fifteen years. Practically saved my life.
DAVENPORT: You see that gear? That's me. I'm the gear that has to spin. And neither the serotonin reuptake inhibitors, nor the man that prescribes them, can stop that. Everyone has something they have to do. I have to put out a paper, you need your article tomorrow.
ROTH: Yes Sir! There are three essential proofs for the existence of an omnipotent benevolent deity, Sir! The primary is that the monotheist cosmological proof in which the Aristotelian causal argument is applied. This is seconded in the madrastic law, in the story of the patriarch, Abraham, gazing at the stars. He equates the night sky to a sumptuous castle found in a field. Taking in its intricacies, one must assume the castle had a builder...
LOUISE: Then, I'd appreciate it if you'd say "could you please have the folders redone by Friday, Louise?" And further more, I was not hired to make coffee. So... if I choose to do so, it will be on a case by case, personal favor basis. Is that understood?
LOUISE: You're the one who told me my lack of assertiveness was limiting my career potential.
WOMAN: I'm a person and I'm important.
DR. TROTT: Welcome to the human race, Dr. Brown.
BRIAN: Ahh, gentlemen, and lady, worship me! For I have brought unto you, New York City!
BRIAN: He wants to be you. Hell, I wouldn't mind being you. Minus the beard.
BRIAN: Like, there's any order of difficulty in the miracles you've performed?
BRIAN: Before you took me under your wing, Andy, I never believed there were people put on this earth simply to fix God's mistakes. That's the sort of gift that doesn't goes away. Sleep easy, Dr. Brown. You're going to be great.
BRIAN: I still got time for a tickle-sectomy!
KAYLA: Because I wear deodorant, unlike some people.
SALLY: Oh, it's not the waiting. It's just that I don't think my husband's allergic to anything that's on your desk. He's allergic to me. He doesn't like all the changes I've made to myself over the last few months so he's decided to go get warts.
REV. KEYES: There's my little ego booster. Glad I'm over here getting pricked to death just so I can kiss you again.
TODD: This is Colin Hart's nurse. I just wanted to call and let you know your boyfriend's doing really well. He's sitting up right now singing the greatest hits of N'Sync.
SALLY: I suppose it must look that way to you. But, it feels like the decision was taken out of our hands. Somewhere down the line Tom and I grew apart. We started wanting different things and we can't go back even if we wanted to. Sometimes we wish we could. 'Cause to tell you the truth, I'm scared out of my mind right now. I'll see you around, Doctor.
REV. KEYES: The gift of community is that each one of us is absolved of the burden of completeness. And in of ourselves that every moment we can lean on one another for the elements we lack. This week I leaned on one of you for this week I lost my marriage. When you join your life with someone, you plan your future. Isn't that truly the definition of hope? To look into the future and imagine a better moment. A glimmer of beauty to strive for. This week I lost all that. At the moment when I was without reason, when I no longer could find meaning of my own, I came here to this church. I believed as I have at other moments of need that I would find God here. I did not. What I found inside this church was a man more dispirited than myself. Crying out to our Lord and seeking comfort in receiving none. I say to this man today, I cannot fix your broken heart. I cannot mend your weakened spirit. What I can do is pour the love of this community into your wound. As your own faith was a healing sieve unto my own. Each year, I select a member of this community who represents the value of hope. This year, I would like to single out a man who is most deserving of our own. Of this community's light and life. That man is Dr. Andrew Brown. There are two states in this life. Love and a call for love. It is the latter which is most requiring of bravery. Come together as a community and help this courageous man find what he came here to seek... peace, joy, hope... for us all.
Everwood: Julia Brown
When I was a kid, I took this train trip with my parents across the country. There was a snowstorm in the mountains and we had to stop for a day in a town called Everwood. It was the most beautiful place I had ever seen, Andy. It was on this hill surrounded by the Rockies. And I remember thinking even then, this is what heaven must look like.
He's a teenager, Andy. Sarcasm is how they express their affections.
Teaching him something isn't the only way to get to know him.
He's a teenager, Andy. Sarcasm is how they express their affections.
Teaching him something isn't the only way to get to know him.
Everwood: Mayor Rose Abbott
Everytime I try to think of something new for us to see or do you just pooh pooh it like I've suggested that we go to a key party and be swingers.
Everybody changes, we can change together.
Listen quick. 'Cause after your behavior this week, Harold, you do not deserve to hear what I'm about to say. And I'm not likely to repeat myself. My affection for you will always outweigh my frustration with you. Despite your asinine comments and your insane shenanigans. I grow more in love with you yearly. 'Cause you're my... stick in the mud.
Everybody changes, we can change together.
Listen quick. 'Cause after your behavior this week, Harold, you do not deserve to hear what I'm about to say. And I'm not likely to repeat myself. My affection for you will always outweigh my frustration with you. Despite your asinine comments and your insane shenanigans. I grow more in love with you yearly. 'Cause you're my... stick in the mud.
Everwood: Nina Feeney
It goes both ways, I guess. I'm not a saint, Andy, and... political beliefs aside, a big part of me did this for the money. I'm hoping that if my husband and I have some real savings in the bank to pay off some loans, maybe he'll stay home more than a few weeks a year. Constant travelling's not really the best thing for a marriage. And I'm not a single parent by choice.
What are you kidding? Sam's in his glory. Delia made a pillow fort and they're defending the living room from mutant raptors.
Oh, he's a charmer. You know he's the kind of kid who forgets to mow your lawn for two weeks, then when he finally comes you end up paying him for three. I think he was all-state football, and pretty smart too.
No-no, for the hope service. Once a year, Reverend Keyes gives what's known as his hope speech and the town fills the place up, no matter their denomination.
The reverend picks the person who he feels best exemplifies hope within the community and everybody wants to get picked. Or at least see who else is gonna get picked.
OK, ghost ship Feeney shoving off.
What are you kidding? Sam's in his glory. Delia made a pillow fort and they're defending the living room from mutant raptors.
Oh, he's a charmer. You know he's the kind of kid who forgets to mow your lawn for two weeks, then when he finally comes you end up paying him for three. I think he was all-state football, and pretty smart too.
No-no, for the hope service. Once a year, Reverend Keyes gives what's known as his hope speech and the town fills the place up, no matter their denomination.
The reverend picks the person who he feels best exemplifies hope within the community and everybody wants to get picked. Or at least see who else is gonna get picked.
OK, ghost ship Feeney shoving off.
Everwood: Irv Harper
NARRATOR: I wasn't there the day Dr. Andrew Brown's life changed forever. But like most folks in Everwood, I've heard the story enough times to be able to tell it. It begins where many stories begin, in the city of New York, where Dr. Brown lived comfortably with his wife and two children.
NARRATOR: Night fell and a nasty storm rolled in. In his usual fashion, Dr. Brown worked late again. So late he was still at the hospital when he received the news. At then, it had seemed to be an accident. Sadly, Andy's wife never made it from home to their son's recital that night. Instead, a life was taken tragically on the icy highway in between. Oh, sure the Browns did the best they could to get by after that. Pretending as though nothing had changed, knowing that everything had. As expected, Dr. Brown wasted no time in going back to work. What wasn't expected was what happened once he got there. And those were Andy Brown's final words as a big-city doctor.
NARRATOR: As it turns out, Andy's leaving caused quite a stir in the medical community. Time magazine even wrote an article about it, calling Andrew Brown's departure from neurosurgery, "one of the great losses of modern medicine." Like a lot of people, you might think they were exaggerating but then... you probably don't know Dr. Brown.
NARRATOR: Everwood, Colorado. Population, just over nine thousand and growing. Founded in 1853, this jewel of the centennial state is home to one of the country's first opera houses, oldest gold mines, third largest chili cook-off, and even the occasional world famous brain surgeon.
NARRATOR: And there they sat. Father and son. Like they were sitting together for the first time. No, I wasn't there the day Dr. Brown's life changed forever. But I was around for many days thereafter. When he and his family would call Everwood, their home.
IRV: It's not often I find a third-grader lost in profound thought on her lunch hour.
NARRATOR: The family doctor. An icon of the American experience. For generations, they've mended our wounds and warmed our hearts. In my life time, Andy Brown was just about the best example I ever knew of one. Doctor-wise, that is. As for the family half of the job title, he was a bit rough around the edges.
NARRATOR: The next day as the temperature climbed; so did the town's excitement. Looking around, it was almost impossible to imagine anyone in Everwood not happy about the recent turn in temperature. Notice I said "almost."
NARRATOR: Welcome to Gino Chang's. Everwood's Friday night culinary hotspot. Gino, the restaurant's proprietor and namesake moved to town from Naples a few years back. At the time, Everwood was without a Chinese restaurant, or an Italian one. So, Gino opened both.
NARRATOR: The first fall thaw that Andy Brown and his family ever knew passed through Everwood later that night. Taking with it, our last bit of warm autumn air. But not our warmth of spirit. That was in the people of Everwood. And in our hearts, some broken, some mending, and some, for the moment, complete.
NARRATOR: Folks move to the country for lots of reasons. Clean air, better schools, stores where you don't have to fake a heart attack to get a salesperson's attention, and diners like this one.
NARRATOR: It may not seem so at first glance, but a lot changes in small towns. Take for instance Everwood's first local bank. It burned down in '66. And they never rebuilt it. Everwood's first gas station was Sinclair Pump and Engine. We have a Mobil now... and you pump your own gas. And of course you all know what happened to the Train Depot. Which brings me to this bridge. Legend has it, the bridge was built by a young man and woman who lived on opposite sides of the river. The two fell in love and constructed the bridge so they could meet in the middle and share what would be their first kiss. From that day on it was known, appropriately enough, as "The Kissing Bridge". Now, if people had just stuck to kissing, Dr. Brown may have been able to avoid one heck of a crisis. But I-I'm getting ahead of myself. The point is, Everwood's gone through a whole lot of changes both inside and out. But the Kissing Bridge has stood the test of time. Evidence, I guess, that some things are built to last... and some things, aren't.
IRV: Edna, I love you. You wouldn't be you without Hal Senior. You wouldn't even be you without that nutter butter son of yours who, I happen to know, means the world to you.
IRV: Now, I don't need you to pretend that you didn't have a life before me. I just need to be able to put my arms around you when you're sad. Even if you are sad over someone else.
NARRATOR: That evening was the last time anyone saw the kissing bridge in its full glory. And even though Everwood's symbol of innocence is no longer with it, people still tell its story. To their children... and the grandchildren. Only now when they do, the ending is a lot more exciting.
NARRATOR: The Everwood Pinecone. It has been a daily press since May 21st, 1985. The day Mr. R. F. Davenport bought, what was even then, an antique printing press, hellbent on single-handedly spreading whatever small town news there was, each and every day. Everyone thought he was crazy but 5,999 issues later, he hasn't missed a single delivery. The Everwood Pinecone. Everwood's own bastion of journalistic integrity and chowder recipes.
IRV: The safest, prettiest fawning site on Earth. Wild berries in the winter, all the thumb and clover you could hope for. But, it's not close. You've got a long day ahead of you.
NARRATOR: There isn't much good a deer can say about hunting season. Except that it only comes once a year. And maybe that it makes them appreciate the few wildlife preserves they have. Like the one your bambi came from.
IRV: She's a kid, not a grenade.
NARRATOR: Like the man with the printing press said, at some point we all have something we just have to do. The gear spins. Sometimes the gear gets you what you want, sometimes it pushes it even further away. Either way, you have to respect the machine.
NARRATOR: Everyone has a touchstone. A last line of defense against the mayhem and sorrow of this world. For some people in Everwood, that person is Dr. Gretchen Trott. Of course, not all of Everwood is worshipped at the shrine of this particular recreational vehicle.
NARRATOR: The thing about your touchstone, you come to depend on it. No matter whether you set out to or not. But not even your own personal rock of Gibraltar is permanent. The rock has her own needs to think of. And just because you want someone to stick around, it doesn't mean she will. Dr. Brown knew something about that.
NARRATOR: Every small town worth its salt has a place like this. A place where the landscape invites us to blend in for a while. Ours is called "Buck's Rock". It's been graced with its own heavenly light that, for most people, it eliminates any and all doubt of a higher power. The purpose for Buck's Rock is quite familiar. It's a place where the lazy days of childhood play themselves out. A place of free from the responsibilities of adult life. A place of innocence.
NARRATOR: When things are working right in the universe, a loss of innocence is usually followed, in time, but an increase in humanity. Time is funny like that. For everything it robs us of, it grants us something. Sometimes it's a new friend, sometimes it's a better understanding of ourselves. Sometimes, it's just a perfect day.
NARRATOR: People go to church for a lot of different reasons. Some for community, some for appearances. While others, and it may be a very few, it's a matter of true faith. The simple fact is... life is hard for most people. By the end of a long week, the soul can be as devoid of spirit as Everwood's Taggard Mine is empty of ore. Only, if you're lucky, when you come here you leave with something more than you came in with.
NARRATOR: Night fell and a nasty storm rolled in. In his usual fashion, Dr. Brown worked late again. So late he was still at the hospital when he received the news. At then, it had seemed to be an accident. Sadly, Andy's wife never made it from home to their son's recital that night. Instead, a life was taken tragically on the icy highway in between. Oh, sure the Browns did the best they could to get by after that. Pretending as though nothing had changed, knowing that everything had. As expected, Dr. Brown wasted no time in going back to work. What wasn't expected was what happened once he got there. And those were Andy Brown's final words as a big-city doctor.
NARRATOR: As it turns out, Andy's leaving caused quite a stir in the medical community. Time magazine even wrote an article about it, calling Andrew Brown's departure from neurosurgery, "one of the great losses of modern medicine." Like a lot of people, you might think they were exaggerating but then... you probably don't know Dr. Brown.
NARRATOR: Everwood, Colorado. Population, just over nine thousand and growing. Founded in 1853, this jewel of the centennial state is home to one of the country's first opera houses, oldest gold mines, third largest chili cook-off, and even the occasional world famous brain surgeon.
NARRATOR: And there they sat. Father and son. Like they were sitting together for the first time. No, I wasn't there the day Dr. Brown's life changed forever. But I was around for many days thereafter. When he and his family would call Everwood, their home.
IRV: It's not often I find a third-grader lost in profound thought on her lunch hour.
NARRATOR: The family doctor. An icon of the American experience. For generations, they've mended our wounds and warmed our hearts. In my life time, Andy Brown was just about the best example I ever knew of one. Doctor-wise, that is. As for the family half of the job title, he was a bit rough around the edges.
NARRATOR: The next day as the temperature climbed; so did the town's excitement. Looking around, it was almost impossible to imagine anyone in Everwood not happy about the recent turn in temperature. Notice I said "almost."
NARRATOR: Welcome to Gino Chang's. Everwood's Friday night culinary hotspot. Gino, the restaurant's proprietor and namesake moved to town from Naples a few years back. At the time, Everwood was without a Chinese restaurant, or an Italian one. So, Gino opened both.
NARRATOR: The first fall thaw that Andy Brown and his family ever knew passed through Everwood later that night. Taking with it, our last bit of warm autumn air. But not our warmth of spirit. That was in the people of Everwood. And in our hearts, some broken, some mending, and some, for the moment, complete.
NARRATOR: Folks move to the country for lots of reasons. Clean air, better schools, stores where you don't have to fake a heart attack to get a salesperson's attention, and diners like this one.
NARRATOR: It may not seem so at first glance, but a lot changes in small towns. Take for instance Everwood's first local bank. It burned down in '66. And they never rebuilt it. Everwood's first gas station was Sinclair Pump and Engine. We have a Mobil now... and you pump your own gas. And of course you all know what happened to the Train Depot. Which brings me to this bridge. Legend has it, the bridge was built by a young man and woman who lived on opposite sides of the river. The two fell in love and constructed the bridge so they could meet in the middle and share what would be their first kiss. From that day on it was known, appropriately enough, as "The Kissing Bridge". Now, if people had just stuck to kissing, Dr. Brown may have been able to avoid one heck of a crisis. But I-I'm getting ahead of myself. The point is, Everwood's gone through a whole lot of changes both inside and out. But the Kissing Bridge has stood the test of time. Evidence, I guess, that some things are built to last... and some things, aren't.
IRV: Edna, I love you. You wouldn't be you without Hal Senior. You wouldn't even be you without that nutter butter son of yours who, I happen to know, means the world to you.
IRV: Now, I don't need you to pretend that you didn't have a life before me. I just need to be able to put my arms around you when you're sad. Even if you are sad over someone else.
NARRATOR: That evening was the last time anyone saw the kissing bridge in its full glory. And even though Everwood's symbol of innocence is no longer with it, people still tell its story. To their children... and the grandchildren. Only now when they do, the ending is a lot more exciting.
NARRATOR: The Everwood Pinecone. It has been a daily press since May 21st, 1985. The day Mr. R. F. Davenport bought, what was even then, an antique printing press, hellbent on single-handedly spreading whatever small town news there was, each and every day. Everyone thought he was crazy but 5,999 issues later, he hasn't missed a single delivery. The Everwood Pinecone. Everwood's own bastion of journalistic integrity and chowder recipes.
IRV: The safest, prettiest fawning site on Earth. Wild berries in the winter, all the thumb and clover you could hope for. But, it's not close. You've got a long day ahead of you.
NARRATOR: There isn't much good a deer can say about hunting season. Except that it only comes once a year. And maybe that it makes them appreciate the few wildlife preserves they have. Like the one your bambi came from.
IRV: She's a kid, not a grenade.
NARRATOR: Like the man with the printing press said, at some point we all have something we just have to do. The gear spins. Sometimes the gear gets you what you want, sometimes it pushes it even further away. Either way, you have to respect the machine.
NARRATOR: Everyone has a touchstone. A last line of defense against the mayhem and sorrow of this world. For some people in Everwood, that person is Dr. Gretchen Trott. Of course, not all of Everwood is worshipped at the shrine of this particular recreational vehicle.
NARRATOR: The thing about your touchstone, you come to depend on it. No matter whether you set out to or not. But not even your own personal rock of Gibraltar is permanent. The rock has her own needs to think of. And just because you want someone to stick around, it doesn't mean she will. Dr. Brown knew something about that.
NARRATOR: Every small town worth its salt has a place like this. A place where the landscape invites us to blend in for a while. Ours is called "Buck's Rock". It's been graced with its own heavenly light that, for most people, it eliminates any and all doubt of a higher power. The purpose for Buck's Rock is quite familiar. It's a place where the lazy days of childhood play themselves out. A place of free from the responsibilities of adult life. A place of innocence.
NARRATOR: When things are working right in the universe, a loss of innocence is usually followed, in time, but an increase in humanity. Time is funny like that. For everything it robs us of, it grants us something. Sometimes it's a new friend, sometimes it's a better understanding of ourselves. Sometimes, it's just a perfect day.
NARRATOR: People go to church for a lot of different reasons. Some for community, some for appearances. While others, and it may be a very few, it's a matter of true faith. The simple fact is... life is hard for most people. By the end of a long week, the soul can be as devoid of spirit as Everwood's Taggard Mine is empty of ore. Only, if you're lucky, when you come here you leave with something more than you came in with.
Everwood: Edna Harper
Well see, I'm in a doctor's office, wearing my nurse whites. My taxes?
Do I strike you as the mourning type?
There's my hunk of a burnin' love as we speak. See you on the flipside, Doctor Rune-y.
Doctor doodle doo.
I find it hard to believe you'd use the word "plethora."
You've got your panties in a bunch that we're gonna steal all your patients? DON'T WORRY. There's enough hoity toities around these parts who don't wanna wait all day in the same room with folks from the wrong side of the mountain.
You know what your trouble is, Junior? Your whole life you've wanted this town to see you the same way they saw your father: wise, generous, big hearted. Trouble is, people can't see what's not there.
You're paying me. We're in this foxhole together, compadre. Don't worry about everyone else. They'll come around. They always do. It's sort of the nature of this place, you're up one day, you're down the next. In the meantime, we have some excellent periodicals.
Ouch. Back on the boardwalk. Oh I'd feel sorry for you, sweetheart, but I enjoy winning too much.
Your mouth is a bigger safety hazard than that old bridge and nobody's torn you down... yet!
It's laziness is all. Bunch of sluggers run the world. People would rather destroy a historical monument than patch a damned hole!
Why in the world would you do a thing like that, has your brain gone AWOL?
Husbands aren't as easy to wrangle as kids, for one thing, they're heavier.
About a hundred times now! I swear, you yammer on like an old woman. Besides, we're almost there.
Your pops and I shared our first kiss on that bridge. He proposed to me on that bridge. And the day I found out I was pregnant with you, I took him down here and told him. I know you think I got on with things too quick after he was gone, I probably did, but your father's death, Harold, is what made me realize, more than ever, just how valuable our one shot at life is. And I didn't want to miss a second more of it. Anyway, I loved him very much! I wanted you to know that.
I understand, but the doctor is out. Waaay out! You can keep crying like that till the botox wears off, but it's not gonna bring him back from the woods any sooner! Monday, that's right!
When I was in Camroon Bay, my second tour, the nasty one, a shell tore through the top of our tent. Landed right between six bunks. We all should've gone up messy right then. But, someone, somewhere, saw fit to make that shell a dud. It just sat there politely un-exploded. Ever since, I figure, I owe Him a lot of favors and me and God, we share a very... comfortable, don't ask/don't tell relationship.
Delia, if I take you for ice-cream, would you promise to stop asking questions?
Don't give me that. A babysitter's job is to make sure the kid doesn't die, that's all.
At ease! Now you listen good, Lieutenant. This young lady here has a question for you concerning your faith. What's required is a regulation Jewish answer for how you know God exists. Are you prepared to answer such a question?
Ah. She's been making a devil's barf full of noise the last dozen miles but I think I've got her fixed.
I worry about my Harold, too. He died two years ago. For a long time I used to wonder if he was OK. If he's... anywhere even. If he can see me. I used to make myself nuts over it. But you know what? You know what? I didn't see it till you came along. Making myself nuts was my way of knowing he's still around. Because you looking all over for God, that's your mom. That's how you know she's OK. She's in you, looking. OK, Private, let's press on.
Not at all. But if you ask me to baby-sit again, you'll meet God.
Word in the Q-T, doc.
No. Let me tell you this, and I mean no offense by it but I'm not entirely sure anyone's ever told you this before: There are some things that you. Can't. Fix.
If you wanna see him, I've gotta have a reason. You could be the Unabomber for all I know.
Do I strike you as the mourning type?
There's my hunk of a burnin' love as we speak. See you on the flipside, Doctor Rune-y.
Doctor doodle doo.
I find it hard to believe you'd use the word "plethora."
You've got your panties in a bunch that we're gonna steal all your patients? DON'T WORRY. There's enough hoity toities around these parts who don't wanna wait all day in the same room with folks from the wrong side of the mountain.
You know what your trouble is, Junior? Your whole life you've wanted this town to see you the same way they saw your father: wise, generous, big hearted. Trouble is, people can't see what's not there.
You're paying me. We're in this foxhole together, compadre. Don't worry about everyone else. They'll come around. They always do. It's sort of the nature of this place, you're up one day, you're down the next. In the meantime, we have some excellent periodicals.
Ouch. Back on the boardwalk. Oh I'd feel sorry for you, sweetheart, but I enjoy winning too much.
Your mouth is a bigger safety hazard than that old bridge and nobody's torn you down... yet!
It's laziness is all. Bunch of sluggers run the world. People would rather destroy a historical monument than patch a damned hole!
Why in the world would you do a thing like that, has your brain gone AWOL?
Husbands aren't as easy to wrangle as kids, for one thing, they're heavier.
About a hundred times now! I swear, you yammer on like an old woman. Besides, we're almost there.
Your pops and I shared our first kiss on that bridge. He proposed to me on that bridge. And the day I found out I was pregnant with you, I took him down here and told him. I know you think I got on with things too quick after he was gone, I probably did, but your father's death, Harold, is what made me realize, more than ever, just how valuable our one shot at life is. And I didn't want to miss a second more of it. Anyway, I loved him very much! I wanted you to know that.
I understand, but the doctor is out. Waaay out! You can keep crying like that till the botox wears off, but it's not gonna bring him back from the woods any sooner! Monday, that's right!
When I was in Camroon Bay, my second tour, the nasty one, a shell tore through the top of our tent. Landed right between six bunks. We all should've gone up messy right then. But, someone, somewhere, saw fit to make that shell a dud. It just sat there politely un-exploded. Ever since, I figure, I owe Him a lot of favors and me and God, we share a very... comfortable, don't ask/don't tell relationship.
Delia, if I take you for ice-cream, would you promise to stop asking questions?
Don't give me that. A babysitter's job is to make sure the kid doesn't die, that's all.
At ease! Now you listen good, Lieutenant. This young lady here has a question for you concerning your faith. What's required is a regulation Jewish answer for how you know God exists. Are you prepared to answer such a question?
Ah. She's been making a devil's barf full of noise the last dozen miles but I think I've got her fixed.
I worry about my Harold, too. He died two years ago. For a long time I used to wonder if he was OK. If he's... anywhere even. If he can see me. I used to make myself nuts over it. But you know what? You know what? I didn't see it till you came along. Making myself nuts was my way of knowing he's still around. Because you looking all over for God, that's your mom. That's how you know she's OK. She's in you, looking. OK, Private, let's press on.
Not at all. But if you ask me to baby-sit again, you'll meet God.
Word in the Q-T, doc.
No. Let me tell you this, and I mean no offense by it but I'm not entirely sure anyone's ever told you this before: There are some things that you. Can't. Fix.
If you wanna see him, I've gotta have a reason. You could be the Unabomber for all I know.
Everwood: Colin Hart
If the British knew they were losing you, they would have fought a little harder.
Aw, your brother's had like 7000 breath mints. It was my idea, Amy. I just thought it would be good to give him some liquid encouragement before he had to go onstage.
I felt you pulling me back. But I was like, trapped. Do you know that dream you have when you're trying to run and your feet are glued to the floor and you're naked? Well, that's how I felt. That my feet were glued to the floor and, my mouth was wired shut. The whole time you were here, I-I kept wanting to say... I love you, Amy. ...and I should've told you that day at the lake but I was afraid. I love you and I can't live without you. You're the reason I came back.
Aw, your brother's had like 7000 breath mints. It was my idea, Amy. I just thought it would be good to give him some liquid encouragement before he had to go onstage.
I felt you pulling me back. But I was like, trapped. Do you know that dream you have when you're trying to run and your feet are glued to the floor and you're naked? Well, that's how I felt. That my feet were glued to the floor and, my mouth was wired shut. The whole time you were here, I-I kept wanting to say... I love you, Amy. ...and I should've told you that day at the lake but I was afraid. I love you and I can't live without you. You're the reason I came back.
Everwood: Dr. Harold Abbott
And behold the people... who had every attribute of dogs, except loyalty.
When I first joined my father's practice, I too went out of my way to become available to all people at all times. I soon realized that exhausting myself was no good for anyone least of all for my family who needed me the most. Being a small town physician is a marathon, Doctor, not sprint. And if one of us is going to win this race, you are going to have to stay in it.
If you wanna break records, you'll have to top my delivery of Jane Desieth's triplets in the women's hosiery aisle of the local Stop and Shop.
You're donating your body to science to further the medical understanding of the North American Dimwit.
Let their parents worry about them. Newsflash! You're not here to save the world, Dr. Brown... just to annoy it.
Well... Um, I have an announcement to make. Due to your mother's warped sense of humor, I'm going to be hosting a sex education assembly at your high school this week. I realize this may be a bit uncomfortable for the both of you, especially considering the highly sensitive subject matter, which is why I wanted to open it up to a family discussion. Any thoughts?
Wondering where your little 'hoodlum' is?
Well, for God's sake, don't tell 'him' that. If they knew we were concerned, they would eat us alive. Teenagers, they, they can smell weakness. They're like dogs.
He's fifteen, he's testing you. You are failing the test.
Listen. I know you wanna be your son's friend, but he doesn't need a friend right now, he needs a parent.
He cut class, you punish him. Take away his phone privileges, don't allow him to... pierce anything for the next six months but do something. Be his father.
Your mother harps on you to go out more often because she doesn't want to see you miserable. I'm saying it because, I don't ever want to see you feel guilty for having a life. Now Colin was never so happy as when you were laughing. As far as being crazy, I won't call anyone crazy, if you won't.
You would. Oh how could anyone in their right mind take that nomadic quack's insights seriously.
Not that! My assistant, Louise. She was a completely normal person before you got to her with your rabid, invasive, self-indulgent paws on her. And stop filling peoples heads with this garbage. Have you no scruples? You wreak people's lives and you charge them for it.
You're like a televangelist.
Because we, The Abbotts, represent everything the people in this community wish they were. We command respect from our neighbors. They look up to us.
Are there no safe havens anymore?
Words are a poor substitute for actions where love is concerned but, my love for you, Rose, is immeasurable. You make sense of my silly little life.
When I first joined my father's practice, I too went out of my way to become available to all people at all times. I soon realized that exhausting myself was no good for anyone least of all for my family who needed me the most. Being a small town physician is a marathon, Doctor, not sprint. And if one of us is going to win this race, you are going to have to stay in it.
If you wanna break records, you'll have to top my delivery of Jane Desieth's triplets in the women's hosiery aisle of the local Stop and Shop.
You're donating your body to science to further the medical understanding of the North American Dimwit.
Let their parents worry about them. Newsflash! You're not here to save the world, Dr. Brown... just to annoy it.
Well... Um, I have an announcement to make. Due to your mother's warped sense of humor, I'm going to be hosting a sex education assembly at your high school this week. I realize this may be a bit uncomfortable for the both of you, especially considering the highly sensitive subject matter, which is why I wanted to open it up to a family discussion. Any thoughts?
Wondering where your little 'hoodlum' is?
Well, for God's sake, don't tell 'him' that. If they knew we were concerned, they would eat us alive. Teenagers, they, they can smell weakness. They're like dogs.
He's fifteen, he's testing you. You are failing the test.
Listen. I know you wanna be your son's friend, but he doesn't need a friend right now, he needs a parent.
He cut class, you punish him. Take away his phone privileges, don't allow him to... pierce anything for the next six months but do something. Be his father.
Your mother harps on you to go out more often because she doesn't want to see you miserable. I'm saying it because, I don't ever want to see you feel guilty for having a life. Now Colin was never so happy as when you were laughing. As far as being crazy, I won't call anyone crazy, if you won't.
You would. Oh how could anyone in their right mind take that nomadic quack's insights seriously.
Not that! My assistant, Louise. She was a completely normal person before you got to her with your rabid, invasive, self-indulgent paws on her. And stop filling peoples heads with this garbage. Have you no scruples? You wreak people's lives and you charge them for it.
You're like a televangelist.
Because we, The Abbotts, represent everything the people in this community wish they were. We command respect from our neighbors. They look up to us.
Are there no safe havens anymore?
Words are a poor substitute for actions where love is concerned but, my love for you, Rose, is immeasurable. You make sense of my silly little life.
Everwood: Bright Abbott
How goes it.. Bone-lick?
Can I get something from a scratched bumper?
Well... Elka, was supremely hot. But, she never sealed the deal with her boyfriend because she had all these, like, religious beliefs. Well... I'm kind of like Elka. In that I'm very attractive but I haven't... you know, done anything. You know... So my reasons have less to do with religion, more to do with the fact that my girlfriends won't, which is why I'm sooo done with Freshmen. Anyway, I didn't want you worrying about me anymore. But, if you could keep this info between us, you know?
Yeah, dude, when are you going to realize that my baby sister doesn't share our sense of adventure?
Uh, Dad, depending on how many people are there today, do you think I could borrow that rifle to shoot myself?
Can I get something from a scratched bumper?
Well... Elka, was supremely hot. But, she never sealed the deal with her boyfriend because she had all these, like, religious beliefs. Well... I'm kind of like Elka. In that I'm very attractive but I haven't... you know, done anything. You know... So my reasons have less to do with religion, more to do with the fact that my girlfriends won't, which is why I'm sooo done with Freshmen. Anyway, I didn't want you worrying about me anymore. But, if you could keep this info between us, you know?
Yeah, dude, when are you going to realize that my baby sister doesn't share our sense of adventure?
Uh, Dad, depending on how many people are there today, do you think I could borrow that rifle to shoot myself?
Everwood: Amy Abbott
Did you ever have the perfect make-out song? Mine's Al Green's "Let's Stay Together". I think it speaks to us girls. A dual desire to be held and ravaged simultaneously. Not in the literal sense. It's more primal. Just listening to this song right now makes me want to take off my clothes.
No, not if you value that collection of porn you stashed on our computer. What's the title of the file name again? Oh, yeah. "Favorite Biblical Passages."
Colin grew up down the block from me. We did everything together. He was the first boy I ever hated, the first boy I ever hit, kissed. Bright and him were best friends. They were always getting into trouble and last Fourth of July, they decided to swipe Colin's dad's truck and go for a joy ride. Colin drove. There was an accident. Bright was thrown from the vehicle. He doesn't remember what happened. And by the time he and the ambulance got there, Colin had fallen unconscious. He hasn't woken up ever since. Every night I pray for a miracle but nothing happens. When I heard about your dad coming to town, I thought if anyone could help him, it'd be him, right? I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, Ephram. I was going to tell you. I just didn't know how.
My boyfriend, Colin, is in a stage four coma and I was wondering if you would perhaps consider using your unique and gifted talents in neurosurgery to help awaken him from his severe head trauma... so that I can sleep with him.
It's my nickname. I always loved Grover as a kid. I know for most kids, it's all "Winnie the Pooh" or "Hello Kitty", or occasionally, "Strawberry Shortcake" but, for me, life was about a little blue Muppet named Grover.
Colin and Bright used to torment me for hours by stealing my Grover doll and hiding him. And then one day Colin refused to give me the doll back unless I kissed him first. Colin that is, not Grover, who I've kissed many, many times. So I closed my eyes, Colin closed his. We both leaned forward... and I kicked him right in the nuts. Colin that is, not Grover who didn't have nuts. At least none that I was aware of. Anyway, Colin screamed and doubled over. My parents raced, rushed straight into the room and when they asked what happened, Colin wouldn't tell them. All he would say was that Grover did it. And suddenly, somehow, I had developed my first crush. On Colin, that is. Not Grover. Look, I know we haven't talked about this since that trip to Denver, so...
That's Kayla and Page. They're allergic to anyone who's not at the top two popularity percentile.
Yeah, I decided not to go. But I couldn't stay home 'cause then my mom would just bug me about how I have to be more social and I can't sit around moping about Colin all the time.
Anyway, what's the big deal about gonorrhea? It's completely curable. Unlike the herp which never goes away. Right, Dad?
Sure, my father's O.C.D. and my brother's A.D.D. and my mother is just plain crazy.
I'm tired. And this dance is just making me feel worse. My mom keeps bugging me about it, it's like, no one understands why this is hard for me. I just wanted to ask him, you know? Like last year. I just wanna feel normal again, just for one second. Instead of how I feel now.
Kim Iron asked David Lee, which no one ever thought she'd have the nerve to do. I swear, ever since she got her braces off, she's like this totally different person. And he said yes, which was so cool. Oh, and the decorating committee's going all out this year. Ally's mom wants to turn the gym into a magical forest. I know it sounds bizarre but, Ally said her mom's practically a professional at this stuff so... should look amazing. I guess now the only thing that's missing is you and me, which is why I'm here. I know it's last minute and everything but... Will you go to the dance with me? You can say yes anytime, Colin. Just open your eyes and say yes. Just open your eyes, Colin, please.
See, you weren't geeky at all. Gwen Stefani was gonna take you.
When new kids get here, they usually spend the first few weeks treading water. No new friends, coasting through classes. Locker, strangely, undecorated. Oh, I'm not really from here, just a temporary stop until my parents' divorce settles or whatever and they can go back to their 'real' home. Usually lasts about a month but, eventually, they settle in.
You wanted me to turn your jaws into a chin, don't abuse the digital age.
You don't think it's crazy? To spend all your free time reading to someone you're not even sure can hear you?
Well well, the warrior is back from his vision quest. Did you find your spirit animal? Let me guess, you're a... marmot.
Whatever, it's cool of you to help. You see that red rope over there? That's where it all starts. Every year it's a mad dash to see who gets the best seats. I swear, you'd think it was a Paul McCartney concert. Ever seen middle-aged people run so fast?
All the girls get bouquets, roses mostly.
I watched this show about comas the other night, on the science channel. It showed people who came out after a long time like, six months or so. Most of them barely even looked human. I remember this one guy's face was frozen in this silent scream, like that painting. And most of their hands were all curled up like Jennifer Hawkaday in Special Ed.
Don't talk about me like I'm not here!
Freaky, right? Funny because the exact same thing happened to me once before when I went on this family trip and I didn't have time to study for Mr. Berney's chem test, I just spazzed out, I just lost it, but you know what? I guess it's good that I got it out of my system because I feel completely, totally together, you know? I'm just so embarrassed that everyone saw me like that. So not typical of me... what?
Honestly, I don't know. But this is, what I've been waiting for, so it's a good thing, right?
It's OK, I should probably stay close to the OR. In case, there's any news. Just wanted to touch base with normal for a minute.
I'm thinking about the moment when Colin finally wakes up. I've thought about it a billion times. And, I know what I'm going to say to him. It's not what you think. I am going to tell him how sorry I am. Ephram, there's a whole part of this thing I've never told anyone about.
You're the only person who's been here for me the whole time. You came to the hospital with me, you... helped convince your dad. The way I see it? The only miracle in my life right now is, the fact that your dad looked at a map, and of all of the places, he decided to move here.
No, not if you value that collection of porn you stashed on our computer. What's the title of the file name again? Oh, yeah. "Favorite Biblical Passages."
Colin grew up down the block from me. We did everything together. He was the first boy I ever hated, the first boy I ever hit, kissed. Bright and him were best friends. They were always getting into trouble and last Fourth of July, they decided to swipe Colin's dad's truck and go for a joy ride. Colin drove. There was an accident. Bright was thrown from the vehicle. He doesn't remember what happened. And by the time he and the ambulance got there, Colin had fallen unconscious. He hasn't woken up ever since. Every night I pray for a miracle but nothing happens. When I heard about your dad coming to town, I thought if anyone could help him, it'd be him, right? I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, Ephram. I was going to tell you. I just didn't know how.
My boyfriend, Colin, is in a stage four coma and I was wondering if you would perhaps consider using your unique and gifted talents in neurosurgery to help awaken him from his severe head trauma... so that I can sleep with him.
It's my nickname. I always loved Grover as a kid. I know for most kids, it's all "Winnie the Pooh" or "Hello Kitty", or occasionally, "Strawberry Shortcake" but, for me, life was about a little blue Muppet named Grover.
Colin and Bright used to torment me for hours by stealing my Grover doll and hiding him. And then one day Colin refused to give me the doll back unless I kissed him first. Colin that is, not Grover, who I've kissed many, many times. So I closed my eyes, Colin closed his. We both leaned forward... and I kicked him right in the nuts. Colin that is, not Grover who didn't have nuts. At least none that I was aware of. Anyway, Colin screamed and doubled over. My parents raced, rushed straight into the room and when they asked what happened, Colin wouldn't tell them. All he would say was that Grover did it. And suddenly, somehow, I had developed my first crush. On Colin, that is. Not Grover. Look, I know we haven't talked about this since that trip to Denver, so...
That's Kayla and Page. They're allergic to anyone who's not at the top two popularity percentile.
Yeah, I decided not to go. But I couldn't stay home 'cause then my mom would just bug me about how I have to be more social and I can't sit around moping about Colin all the time.
Anyway, what's the big deal about gonorrhea? It's completely curable. Unlike the herp which never goes away. Right, Dad?
Sure, my father's O.C.D. and my brother's A.D.D. and my mother is just plain crazy.
I'm tired. And this dance is just making me feel worse. My mom keeps bugging me about it, it's like, no one understands why this is hard for me. I just wanted to ask him, you know? Like last year. I just wanna feel normal again, just for one second. Instead of how I feel now.
Kim Iron asked David Lee, which no one ever thought she'd have the nerve to do. I swear, ever since she got her braces off, she's like this totally different person. And he said yes, which was so cool. Oh, and the decorating committee's going all out this year. Ally's mom wants to turn the gym into a magical forest. I know it sounds bizarre but, Ally said her mom's practically a professional at this stuff so... should look amazing. I guess now the only thing that's missing is you and me, which is why I'm here. I know it's last minute and everything but... Will you go to the dance with me? You can say yes anytime, Colin. Just open your eyes and say yes. Just open your eyes, Colin, please.
See, you weren't geeky at all. Gwen Stefani was gonna take you.
When new kids get here, they usually spend the first few weeks treading water. No new friends, coasting through classes. Locker, strangely, undecorated. Oh, I'm not really from here, just a temporary stop until my parents' divorce settles or whatever and they can go back to their 'real' home. Usually lasts about a month but, eventually, they settle in.
You wanted me to turn your jaws into a chin, don't abuse the digital age.
You don't think it's crazy? To spend all your free time reading to someone you're not even sure can hear you?
Well well, the warrior is back from his vision quest. Did you find your spirit animal? Let me guess, you're a... marmot.
Whatever, it's cool of you to help. You see that red rope over there? That's where it all starts. Every year it's a mad dash to see who gets the best seats. I swear, you'd think it was a Paul McCartney concert. Ever seen middle-aged people run so fast?
All the girls get bouquets, roses mostly.
I watched this show about comas the other night, on the science channel. It showed people who came out after a long time like, six months or so. Most of them barely even looked human. I remember this one guy's face was frozen in this silent scream, like that painting. And most of their hands were all curled up like Jennifer Hawkaday in Special Ed.
Don't talk about me like I'm not here!
Freaky, right? Funny because the exact same thing happened to me once before when I went on this family trip and I didn't have time to study for Mr. Berney's chem test, I just spazzed out, I just lost it, but you know what? I guess it's good that I got it out of my system because I feel completely, totally together, you know? I'm just so embarrassed that everyone saw me like that. So not typical of me... what?
Honestly, I don't know. But this is, what I've been waiting for, so it's a good thing, right?
It's OK, I should probably stay close to the OR. In case, there's any news. Just wanted to touch base with normal for a minute.
I'm thinking about the moment when Colin finally wakes up. I've thought about it a billion times. And, I know what I'm going to say to him. It's not what you think. I am going to tell him how sorry I am. Ephram, there's a whole part of this thing I've never told anyone about.
You're the only person who's been here for me the whole time. You came to the hospital with me, you... helped convince your dad. The way I see it? The only miracle in my life right now is, the fact that your dad looked at a map, and of all of the places, he decided to move here.
Everwood: Delia Brown
I will! After you return what's mine. You need a friend just as much as I do, Magilla. You're just too scared to show it..
Not exactly. You see, when it's just me and him, he's nice to me. But when other people are around, he says I'm diseased.
I just wanted to know about God because if there's no God, then there's no heaven.
I don't wanna make new friends. I don't wanna say goodbye to people anymore.
I don't think I'm going to be a brain surgeon when I grow up. Well, for one thing, you have to wake up early. Even on Saturday. And because I'm probably going to be a tap dancer!
Not exactly. You see, when it's just me and him, he's nice to me. But when other people are around, he says I'm diseased.
I just wanted to know about God because if there's no God, then there's no heaven.
I don't wanna make new friends. I don't wanna say goodbye to people anymore.
I don't think I'm going to be a brain surgeon when I grow up. Well, for one thing, you have to wake up early. Even on Saturday. And because I'm probably going to be a tap dancer!
Everwood: Dr. Andrew Brown
I can't save your life. At best, I could prolong it eight months. Maybe a year. But for most of that time, you'd be barely coherent, recovering from surgery. But that's all so this hospital can brag about its statistics for terminal illnesses. But those statistics don't measure quality of life. And if you have the slightest hope about preserving of your own, you'd get up out of that bed and leave this place as fast as your legs will carry you.
Why put off tomorrow when you can diagnose today?
I wanted to see you. To know that you're more than just a memory. And to tell you that I kept my promise. You didn't keep yours. You promised me you'd be here... in Everwood. But, you're not.
Ephram, I wish I could tell you everything's gonna be OK. I know that's what I'm supposed to say. But the truth is, I don't know what's gonna happen to us. But what I do know is that all we have now is each other. I need your help raising your sister. I can't do it alone. She gets us.
I'll tell you what. I'll stay away from recipes that involve three or more ingredients if you stay away from first aid kits.
Everwood's enough of an escape for me.
I was once a happy sack of hormones myself.
If biology allows a man to become a father until the day he dies, why should a woman have to give up that dream at the age of forty-five?
Well, who's to say what's natural? All species adapt. Female dogs have been known to nurse baby kittens. Is that natural?
No, no. I admit. When I first saw the mother of the child, I thought she was too old to become a parent for the first time. But, today I learned from Nina just how badly that woman wants a family. And I don't think the qualifications for parenthood should have anything to do with age. What's so unnatural about wanting a family? To me, what's unnatural is not wanting one! And, let's not forget about Nina. If she can use this money to keep her husband home a few more weeks a year... then she hasn't just helped to create a family, she's helped to save her own.
Ah, DAMN IT! Oh, looks like you got the last laugh, Walter. There's no sea, there's no breeze. There's more wood in my hand than your friggin boat. Remind me next time to take the steaks. Oh no. Oh no, no, no, no. I hope you're watching this, Julia. You'll be getting a big kick out of this! 'Cause this is for you, sweetheart! That's right, Mrs. Brown. Your whole family left a civilized life in a civilized city for some godforsaken mountain town 'cause your train stopped here in 1964 and you fell in love with some purple mountains and some fluffy clouds! But you didn't know this town, Julia! You didn't meet the people! 'Cause you didn't get past the gift shop! I MOVED US TO A SNOW GLOBE!!! Oh God. WHAT AM I DOING HERE?!?!?
Is there anybody in this community who is not related to one another?
...what I mean to say is that one in ten kids will have sex before the age of 13. One in four of those kids will get a sexually transmitted disease. Like it or not, our children are having sex. Now, we can either teach them how to be safe about it so they don't die or we can stay in our cocoons, wax poetic about the good old days and pretend it isn't happening.
Because you're scaring the sick people away and we don't charge.
Well, I think that's your first step. Oh, I hate to dispense advice and run, Edna, but I'm late for school. So hand me some condoms and wish me luck.
Don't forget: when you go over the symptoms of gonorrhea, talk slowly. Odds are there's at least one kid in your assembly who has it.
Well, you know, honey, boys and girls are very different. Not just how they look on the outside, but how they work things out on the inside. For instance, when you wanna be friends with a boy, you might wanna bake him cookies.
Right. OK... but if a boy wants to be friends with you, he might punch you. As a sign of friendship.
You think I should call the police? Or, or do you think that's crazy? It's too soon to call the police, don't you think? How could he get lost? And why wasn't he at school? Did he get lost on his way to school?
DR. BROWN: I'm not about to let my 15 year old, who doesn't know a pine tree from a baked potato, go exploring the tundra alone. If you wanna go, you'd better pack enough trail mix for two!
You know why? Giardia lamblia. A protozoan come water-borne cyst with a nasty knack for twisting up the ileum duodena. I also know that young Bambi, here, has four stomachs; rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. You know, I always wanted there to be a fifth called aboabomasum, but there wasn't. Also, deer can run over 35 miles an hour...
I used to navigate peoples frontal lobes for a living, Ephram. I think I can follow directions.
She's a wild animal. She's thinking 'hi. Are you made of food?'. Come on, keep up. We're making good time.
Your mom used to be the only one who could call me on it. It used to help me keep people alive. Taking charge, knowing the right thing to say all the time. It's an instinct that I cultivated for surgery that made me capable of doing things so fantastic, I can't even take credit for 'em. That same compulsion that people nurtured in me then, is what's making me... making me screw everything up now. For you, for Delia. These past few months I feel like, the only thing I've done right, is help a few strangers get better and... stop talking out loud to my dead wife.
Mmm. That reminds me of something your mom used to say. She said that coincidence was just God's way of preserving physics.
What is that thing? Blood van? Ice cream truck? Book mobile?
As Dr. Latham and the Denver team have told you, the causes of short term coma are generally discrete and identifiable, while the causes of prolonged coma can often be idiopathic... of unknown origin. In Colin's case, the neuro team has carefully monitored his intracranial pressure, and provided what I think is well above the standard of care. You can be confident, that up to this point, you've done everything possible for your son. And... There is what we believe to be a small fragment of bone lodged in Colin's brain. More specifically in the brain stem where it would be extremely difficult to remove. Dr. Latham doesn't believe that the relationship between this fragment and your son's prolonged comatose state is causable.
Actually, no. The brain stem handles the most elemental tasks that the brain performs. Were we to undertake this surgery successfully, it would be medically reportable. Well, it would be an experiment of sorts. By that, I mean that experimentation occurs all of the time in medicine. It's how innovation takes place, it's how lives are saved. I want you to know I don't undertake this lightly. I've performed over 200 procedures a year in the last fifteen years and if I'm not mistaken, I have one of the highest success rates in the country.
The meatloaf is very versatile is what I was gonna say.
Andy Brown. Pleased to meet you. You know, Delia was telling me an amusing story on the way over here. She said that she and your son were playing the other day, and, ah, this is hard for me to believe 'cause Delia has been a tomboy ever since she was in the womb. But the, well, they were playing dress up. Well, I can assure you that, as a physician, that at this age, that kind of play is perfectly alright. All the same, if it bothers you, you don't have to worry 'cause it won't happen again.
That didn't sound very enthusiastic. Friend's still not talking to ya, huh? Kid's got a lot of willpower for a third grader.
Do you believe this? Those parents yank their kid out of school for playing dress up? I mean that's, that's medieval! Alright Delia, here's what we're gonna do, we are going over there right now.
Stuart won't be able to put it behind him. Maybe that's not such a bad thing. These kids grow up to be very special people. They've got a lifetime of empathy inside of them by the time they turn 10 and, that's a tremendous gift. But you cannot put him in a box and try...
I had a medical consultation last week. Parents wouldn't consent. They wouldn't put their faith in me.
I wasn't thinking about me or my abilities, I was thinking about these people. Someone's parents, someone's son. This kid is the boyfriend of a girl that my kid goes to school with. I was thinking that if something goes wrong, if we can't bring him out... I was thinking about the outcome. You never think about the outcome. I just lied to you. The truth is, in the end, it was me. I told them I wouldn't do it.
Well, doctors don't have all the answers, Ephram.
No. Sometimes parents have the answers too.
Ephram would hate me in every one of the forty-eight contiguous states plus Hawaii and Alaska so we might as well be here.
These are the mix tapes that your mom made for our surgeries. She'd figure out what song to pick based on what kind of surgery we were doing. For instance, Glioma '97 has an upbeat Motown kind of a feel whereas triple aneurysm '99 is more of an angry lesbian with a guitar kind of mix. And here's my personal favorite: Middle Fossa skull base 2000!
Ah, competitiveness springs eternal.
I'm surprised this place isn't falling down right now. [gathering his thoughts] Just over eight months ago, that was the last time I knew life was worth living. All my dreams died with Julia. I wake up every morning and wish I was still asleep. See, the thing is I... my heart's still pumping and I'm still breathing. I still move in the world but, I've lost my joy. We don't talk a lot. I don't complain to you. I don't ask for favors. I don't whine about fairness. And I never believed that you owed me anything. But I am telling you right now, I have got nothing left. I used to have a gift. Now everything I touch, everyone I touch I-is just as broken as I am. I've got two kids, who need a mother and a father. These days, I'm not much use to anyone. Let alone them. I thought I knew what you needed from me. I thought I knew what my life was about. I don't know anything. [crying] You've gotta help me? Please give me my joy back?
Why put off tomorrow when you can diagnose today?
I wanted to see you. To know that you're more than just a memory. And to tell you that I kept my promise. You didn't keep yours. You promised me you'd be here... in Everwood. But, you're not.
Ephram, I wish I could tell you everything's gonna be OK. I know that's what I'm supposed to say. But the truth is, I don't know what's gonna happen to us. But what I do know is that all we have now is each other. I need your help raising your sister. I can't do it alone. She gets us.
I'll tell you what. I'll stay away from recipes that involve three or more ingredients if you stay away from first aid kits.
Everwood's enough of an escape for me.
I was once a happy sack of hormones myself.
If biology allows a man to become a father until the day he dies, why should a woman have to give up that dream at the age of forty-five?
Well, who's to say what's natural? All species adapt. Female dogs have been known to nurse baby kittens. Is that natural?
No, no. I admit. When I first saw the mother of the child, I thought she was too old to become a parent for the first time. But, today I learned from Nina just how badly that woman wants a family. And I don't think the qualifications for parenthood should have anything to do with age. What's so unnatural about wanting a family? To me, what's unnatural is not wanting one! And, let's not forget about Nina. If she can use this money to keep her husband home a few more weeks a year... then she hasn't just helped to create a family, she's helped to save her own.
Ah, DAMN IT! Oh, looks like you got the last laugh, Walter. There's no sea, there's no breeze. There's more wood in my hand than your friggin boat. Remind me next time to take the steaks. Oh no. Oh no, no, no, no. I hope you're watching this, Julia. You'll be getting a big kick out of this! 'Cause this is for you, sweetheart! That's right, Mrs. Brown. Your whole family left a civilized life in a civilized city for some godforsaken mountain town 'cause your train stopped here in 1964 and you fell in love with some purple mountains and some fluffy clouds! But you didn't know this town, Julia! You didn't meet the people! 'Cause you didn't get past the gift shop! I MOVED US TO A SNOW GLOBE!!! Oh God. WHAT AM I DOING HERE?!?!?
Is there anybody in this community who is not related to one another?
...what I mean to say is that one in ten kids will have sex before the age of 13. One in four of those kids will get a sexually transmitted disease. Like it or not, our children are having sex. Now, we can either teach them how to be safe about it so they don't die or we can stay in our cocoons, wax poetic about the good old days and pretend it isn't happening.
Because you're scaring the sick people away and we don't charge.
Well, I think that's your first step. Oh, I hate to dispense advice and run, Edna, but I'm late for school. So hand me some condoms and wish me luck.
Don't forget: when you go over the symptoms of gonorrhea, talk slowly. Odds are there's at least one kid in your assembly who has it.
Well, you know, honey, boys and girls are very different. Not just how they look on the outside, but how they work things out on the inside. For instance, when you wanna be friends with a boy, you might wanna bake him cookies.
Right. OK... but if a boy wants to be friends with you, he might punch you. As a sign of friendship.
You think I should call the police? Or, or do you think that's crazy? It's too soon to call the police, don't you think? How could he get lost? And why wasn't he at school? Did he get lost on his way to school?
DR. BROWN: I'm not about to let my 15 year old, who doesn't know a pine tree from a baked potato, go exploring the tundra alone. If you wanna go, you'd better pack enough trail mix for two!
You know why? Giardia lamblia. A protozoan come water-borne cyst with a nasty knack for twisting up the ileum duodena. I also know that young Bambi, here, has four stomachs; rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. You know, I always wanted there to be a fifth called aboabomasum, but there wasn't. Also, deer can run over 35 miles an hour...
I used to navigate peoples frontal lobes for a living, Ephram. I think I can follow directions.
She's a wild animal. She's thinking 'hi. Are you made of food?'. Come on, keep up. We're making good time.
Your mom used to be the only one who could call me on it. It used to help me keep people alive. Taking charge, knowing the right thing to say all the time. It's an instinct that I cultivated for surgery that made me capable of doing things so fantastic, I can't even take credit for 'em. That same compulsion that people nurtured in me then, is what's making me... making me screw everything up now. For you, for Delia. These past few months I feel like, the only thing I've done right, is help a few strangers get better and... stop talking out loud to my dead wife.
Mmm. That reminds me of something your mom used to say. She said that coincidence was just God's way of preserving physics.
What is that thing? Blood van? Ice cream truck? Book mobile?
As Dr. Latham and the Denver team have told you, the causes of short term coma are generally discrete and identifiable, while the causes of prolonged coma can often be idiopathic... of unknown origin. In Colin's case, the neuro team has carefully monitored his intracranial pressure, and provided what I think is well above the standard of care. You can be confident, that up to this point, you've done everything possible for your son. And... There is what we believe to be a small fragment of bone lodged in Colin's brain. More specifically in the brain stem where it would be extremely difficult to remove. Dr. Latham doesn't believe that the relationship between this fragment and your son's prolonged comatose state is causable.
Actually, no. The brain stem handles the most elemental tasks that the brain performs. Were we to undertake this surgery successfully, it would be medically reportable. Well, it would be an experiment of sorts. By that, I mean that experimentation occurs all of the time in medicine. It's how innovation takes place, it's how lives are saved. I want you to know I don't undertake this lightly. I've performed over 200 procedures a year in the last fifteen years and if I'm not mistaken, I have one of the highest success rates in the country.
The meatloaf is very versatile is what I was gonna say.
Andy Brown. Pleased to meet you. You know, Delia was telling me an amusing story on the way over here. She said that she and your son were playing the other day, and, ah, this is hard for me to believe 'cause Delia has been a tomboy ever since she was in the womb. But the, well, they were playing dress up. Well, I can assure you that, as a physician, that at this age, that kind of play is perfectly alright. All the same, if it bothers you, you don't have to worry 'cause it won't happen again.
That didn't sound very enthusiastic. Friend's still not talking to ya, huh? Kid's got a lot of willpower for a third grader.
Do you believe this? Those parents yank their kid out of school for playing dress up? I mean that's, that's medieval! Alright Delia, here's what we're gonna do, we are going over there right now.
Stuart won't be able to put it behind him. Maybe that's not such a bad thing. These kids grow up to be very special people. They've got a lifetime of empathy inside of them by the time they turn 10 and, that's a tremendous gift. But you cannot put him in a box and try...
I had a medical consultation last week. Parents wouldn't consent. They wouldn't put their faith in me.
I wasn't thinking about me or my abilities, I was thinking about these people. Someone's parents, someone's son. This kid is the boyfriend of a girl that my kid goes to school with. I was thinking that if something goes wrong, if we can't bring him out... I was thinking about the outcome. You never think about the outcome. I just lied to you. The truth is, in the end, it was me. I told them I wouldn't do it.
Well, doctors don't have all the answers, Ephram.
No. Sometimes parents have the answers too.
Ephram would hate me in every one of the forty-eight contiguous states plus Hawaii and Alaska so we might as well be here.
These are the mix tapes that your mom made for our surgeries. She'd figure out what song to pick based on what kind of surgery we were doing. For instance, Glioma '97 has an upbeat Motown kind of a feel whereas triple aneurysm '99 is more of an angry lesbian with a guitar kind of mix. And here's my personal favorite: Middle Fossa skull base 2000!
Ah, competitiveness springs eternal.
I'm surprised this place isn't falling down right now. [gathering his thoughts] Just over eight months ago, that was the last time I knew life was worth living. All my dreams died with Julia. I wake up every morning and wish I was still asleep. See, the thing is I... my heart's still pumping and I'm still breathing. I still move in the world but, I've lost my joy. We don't talk a lot. I don't complain to you. I don't ask for favors. I don't whine about fairness. And I never believed that you owed me anything. But I am telling you right now, I have got nothing left. I used to have a gift. Now everything I touch, everyone I touch I-is just as broken as I am. I've got two kids, who need a mother and a father. These days, I'm not much use to anyone. Let alone them. I thought I knew what you needed from me. I thought I knew what my life was about. I don't know anything. [crying] You've gotta help me? Please give me my joy back?
Everwood: Ephram Brown
Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't understand. You see, I don't speak dumb-ass. Since obviously you do, maybe you can translate for me.
I find it's best when dealing with any unfamiliar bully to strike early with sarcasm. Yeah, it makes them wonder if I have some butt-kicking prowess that they're unable to detect.
Oh. It's like this: You're eight years old. He misses your birthday party. You wanna cry about it but he's on TV that night for separating the heads of Siamese twins. You're ten. He's not there to see you in the school play. He is however in the New York Times for restoring the vision of a five-year-old kid. I think he was my dad's excuse for missing my elementary school graduation. You know you want to be mad at him. You wanna hate him. But you can't. He's saving lives.
Yes, Father. For it is only through the gift of music that I can truly heal the pain that's been growing deep within me. Like, you've ever cared that I've played or not.
Well, if you wanted to talk, you could have just talked to me. I mean, you didn't have to go through all the trouble of imitating feminine cursive.
Bright? That's his name? Ironic.
You know, I got this black eye because of you. Dick.
Oh, yeah. Sure. That was right on my list of things to do today. Right between picking up my dry cleaning and chopping off my hand.
It was OK. I found out I'm in love with in a girl who's in love with a guy that's in a coma. Other than that it was pretty standard.
Well, isn't there a half Jewish grace?
That's what she says every time. Like a junkie begging for more smack.
I'd like to take a moment and point out that this is... hands down the weirdest restaurant we've ever been to. And we're from New York City where we're regularly served by drag queens named Frank.
In what universe, do hayrides and Ferris wheels translate into fun?
This really is the town that time forgot.
So? What do people do up here aside from wait for an early demise?
I see her too, sometimes. Mom, I mean. Not like you do. I don't talk to her or anything. More like I-I feel her, with us, w-when we're all having dinner or when there's a song playing on the radio that she used to like. I-I just know she's there.
My nickname's a deli item.
H-He said no. I mean you can't really begrudge the guy. He's trying to get out of the brain business, start a new life.
Well, I figured we should have meatloaf flavored meatloaf for a change.
Look, Delia, you wanna make a friend? The first step, don't look so needy.
Trust me. If you look like you don't need a friend, you'll make one in a flash.
Forget it. He's a bully. You've gotta kick his butt, that's the only way to deal with a bully.
Mom used to make banana bread for the bake sales. She didn't front-line any of my sex assemblies.
I want you not to do this. If you do, it's gonna make my life even more unbearable than it already is, which is, like not even humanly possible.
I'm serious, Amy. I would give anything to be able to talk to my mom again. I-It wouldn't matter to me if she'd be able to answer, I'd just be happy to see her.
It's OK. I only went to one dance at my old school. The winter semi-formal. I asked Kathryn Adams to go. She wasn't the most popular girl in school, but she was the prettiest. She had this whole punk-Gwen Stefani look going on, which most girls in high school can't pull off but... she did. Anyway, my friends dared me to ask her. I did. And she actually said yes, which is like, total shock. The day of the dance, Kathryn calls. She's sick, she can't go. Now, of course, I can't tell my mom this because she's so excited for me and I don't want her to know what a loser her son is. So I get all dressed up in my suit, grab the corsage and leave like I'm gonna go pick up Kathryn. Except of course I don't. Instead, I go see Rush Hour 2, which, actually is a pretty decent movie.
I thought girls liked beauty magazines and books about ponies.
Because Elmer was going to dump it on a rifle range. Practically painted a bull's-eye on its ass.
Lucky me, you remember a book you read on relationships in high school.
Well you have to admit, it worked pretty well. I had my own life, I could make my own decisions. Do things I wanted to from time to time.
Don't! You are forbidden from dispensing advice on anything, ever! You're fired!
OK, Bambi. Now I know this isn't your old home, but, looks doable to me. Then again, I used to go to school above 96th street. Anyway, there's no hunting up here. Now I'd love to tell you that everything’s gonna be OK. That's what everyone told me but, it's just not. You can stay here, or you can go back. Either way, it's gonna suck. But I figure, at least when it sucks, you know you're alive. I guess what I'm trying to say is, it's OK when everything sucks, it means you're somewhere. Now, I gotta go.
Thing is, I lied to you. I fixed it, but I lied. You asked me to ask my dad to help Colin. I said I did, but I didn't. See, my problem is, and this is really just one of a whole bus load, I lost my home recently. I-I can't get it back. It took climbing a mountain for me to realize this. But, you were right. I came to Everwood and I'm just coasting. I haven't made anything for myself here... except you. You're what makes this home to me. I was afraid if my dad helped Colin, I'd lose all that. But, but I get it. I mean, it takes me a while but, but I catch up. Colin is your home. So, I asked my dad to help him. He's gonna look at him tomorrow. Not that that in anyway makes up for anything I've done but... it's happening. I am sorry.
Well, in this town, people are different. I mean y-y-you gotta know 'em twenty five years before they let you change their tire.
You have to have a "parent" talk.
No, it's impossible. I mean my dad's a jerk but, he's never turned anyone down before, my dad's never met long odds he didn't like.
Because the guy I know would give his left nut to save a guy in a coma and, you know, be the town hero.
You're talking faster than my brain processes language.
You know there was this invention a couple years ago, it was called the CD Player, you should check it out.
So he's basically like God.
There is no way I'm playing you in Scrabble. You've been published in the "Scientific American". But I will kick your butt in Clue.
You wanna see a mugshot? You should look at my 7th grade yearbook picture.
I find it's best when dealing with any unfamiliar bully to strike early with sarcasm. Yeah, it makes them wonder if I have some butt-kicking prowess that they're unable to detect.
Oh. It's like this: You're eight years old. He misses your birthday party. You wanna cry about it but he's on TV that night for separating the heads of Siamese twins. You're ten. He's not there to see you in the school play. He is however in the New York Times for restoring the vision of a five-year-old kid. I think he was my dad's excuse for missing my elementary school graduation. You know you want to be mad at him. You wanna hate him. But you can't. He's saving lives.
Yes, Father. For it is only through the gift of music that I can truly heal the pain that's been growing deep within me. Like, you've ever cared that I've played or not.
Well, if you wanted to talk, you could have just talked to me. I mean, you didn't have to go through all the trouble of imitating feminine cursive.
Bright? That's his name? Ironic.
You know, I got this black eye because of you. Dick.
Oh, yeah. Sure. That was right on my list of things to do today. Right between picking up my dry cleaning and chopping off my hand.
It was OK. I found out I'm in love with in a girl who's in love with a guy that's in a coma. Other than that it was pretty standard.
Well, isn't there a half Jewish grace?
That's what she says every time. Like a junkie begging for more smack.
I'd like to take a moment and point out that this is... hands down the weirdest restaurant we've ever been to. And we're from New York City where we're regularly served by drag queens named Frank.
In what universe, do hayrides and Ferris wheels translate into fun?
This really is the town that time forgot.
So? What do people do up here aside from wait for an early demise?
I see her too, sometimes. Mom, I mean. Not like you do. I don't talk to her or anything. More like I-I feel her, with us, w-when we're all having dinner or when there's a song playing on the radio that she used to like. I-I just know she's there.
My nickname's a deli item.
H-He said no. I mean you can't really begrudge the guy. He's trying to get out of the brain business, start a new life.
Well, I figured we should have meatloaf flavored meatloaf for a change.
Look, Delia, you wanna make a friend? The first step, don't look so needy.
Trust me. If you look like you don't need a friend, you'll make one in a flash.
Forget it. He's a bully. You've gotta kick his butt, that's the only way to deal with a bully.
Mom used to make banana bread for the bake sales. She didn't front-line any of my sex assemblies.
I want you not to do this. If you do, it's gonna make my life even more unbearable than it already is, which is, like not even humanly possible.
I'm serious, Amy. I would give anything to be able to talk to my mom again. I-It wouldn't matter to me if she'd be able to answer, I'd just be happy to see her.
It's OK. I only went to one dance at my old school. The winter semi-formal. I asked Kathryn Adams to go. She wasn't the most popular girl in school, but she was the prettiest. She had this whole punk-Gwen Stefani look going on, which most girls in high school can't pull off but... she did. Anyway, my friends dared me to ask her. I did. And she actually said yes, which is like, total shock. The day of the dance, Kathryn calls. She's sick, she can't go. Now, of course, I can't tell my mom this because she's so excited for me and I don't want her to know what a loser her son is. So I get all dressed up in my suit, grab the corsage and leave like I'm gonna go pick up Kathryn. Except of course I don't. Instead, I go see Rush Hour 2, which, actually is a pretty decent movie.
I thought girls liked beauty magazines and books about ponies.
Because Elmer was going to dump it on a rifle range. Practically painted a bull's-eye on its ass.
Lucky me, you remember a book you read on relationships in high school.
Well you have to admit, it worked pretty well. I had my own life, I could make my own decisions. Do things I wanted to from time to time.
Don't! You are forbidden from dispensing advice on anything, ever! You're fired!
OK, Bambi. Now I know this isn't your old home, but, looks doable to me. Then again, I used to go to school above 96th street. Anyway, there's no hunting up here. Now I'd love to tell you that everything’s gonna be OK. That's what everyone told me but, it's just not. You can stay here, or you can go back. Either way, it's gonna suck. But I figure, at least when it sucks, you know you're alive. I guess what I'm trying to say is, it's OK when everything sucks, it means you're somewhere. Now, I gotta go.
Thing is, I lied to you. I fixed it, but I lied. You asked me to ask my dad to help Colin. I said I did, but I didn't. See, my problem is, and this is really just one of a whole bus load, I lost my home recently. I-I can't get it back. It took climbing a mountain for me to realize this. But, you were right. I came to Everwood and I'm just coasting. I haven't made anything for myself here... except you. You're what makes this home to me. I was afraid if my dad helped Colin, I'd lose all that. But, but I get it. I mean, it takes me a while but, but I catch up. Colin is your home. So, I asked my dad to help him. He's gonna look at him tomorrow. Not that that in anyway makes up for anything I've done but... it's happening. I am sorry.
Well, in this town, people are different. I mean y-y-you gotta know 'em twenty five years before they let you change their tire.
You have to have a "parent" talk.
No, it's impossible. I mean my dad's a jerk but, he's never turned anyone down before, my dad's never met long odds he didn't like.
Because the guy I know would give his left nut to save a guy in a coma and, you know, be the town hero.
You're talking faster than my brain processes language.
You know there was this invention a couple years ago, it was called the CD Player, you should check it out.
So he's basically like God.
There is no way I'm playing you in Scrabble. You've been published in the "Scientific American". But I will kick your butt in Clue.
You wanna see a mugshot? You should look at my 7th grade yearbook picture.
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