This episode begins with the brilliant plot device of Mary's dream. Mary dreamed she was a professional basketball player. Subsequently, she of course believes that she will, in fact, become a professional basketball player in her waking life. All I want to say at this point is THANK HEAVEN for 7th Heaven. As a parent, I worry. With the way the world is today, I have to worry about my children and the trials they will endure. I wonder if I'm up to the challenge of raising my sons with morals in this nation, which has sadly lost sight of the family values that you and I hold dear. I'm glad to have a beacon in the storm. That beacon is 7th Heaven. Its light is shone brightly by Aaron Spelling. Because of him, I now know how to respond in the face of my children's non-premonition dreams.
So Coach Cleary wants to meet with Mary. Mary figures it must be because he wants to get her on a pro team. Why does she assume this? Because of the dream, silly! Mary tells this to Annie, who is skeptical. Annie says that dreams are like movies. They're entertainment. Some are good, some are bad. I agree. Dreams are like movies, and mushroom-induced hallucinations are like cheesy television. I ate a mushroom that I found in my garden yesterday. I had this MESSED up vision of Reverend Camden -- he was wearing a wig and stealing my pecans. As soon as my head cleared, I went into my bedroom, lit my Virgen de Milagros candle, and cranked on the tape of this episode. I'm feeling much better now, thanks.
Mary maintains that the coach must be calling to "set [her] up with the pros." Annie asks her about college. Mary says this could be better than college. She sighs and asks why StuporMom isn't excited for her. Annie will be excited when she finds out what Coach Cleary is up to. She's sure it's something good. Mary and her orange vest go out the front door. RevCam, Simon, and Ruthie come downstairs. Ruthie asks Annie if she's heard that Mary's going to play pro ball. RevCam says that Mary still has four years of college ahead of her. Ruthie says she dreams of being the queen of England. Everyone smiles, which they really shouldn't do because it only encourages her to say these stupid things. Ruthie goes outside. RevCam asks Simon what he wants to be when he grows up. The big, black caterpillars on Simon's forehead move around as he says, "I don't know. Not a minister," and walks off. Dang, Simon, just stab your dad right in the head, why don't you? Annie tries to play it off. RevCam is still hurt. Annie does that trick where she makes each eyeball look at opposite sides of the room as she tells him, "Oh, come on. You can't take that to heart. He didn't mean to hurt you!" Intellectually, RevCam knows that. And yet . . . and yet he's still making his sad face. Poor guy. I can't believe Simon doesn't want to grow up to overthrow his dad in the high-stakes world of local Christendom.
Lucy's up in the nursery, replacing a knob on the twins' dresser. ("Knob" -- shout-out to Maggie!) Annie walks in and says the school bus is pulling out. I think she means their cool electric van, though. Lucy asks her mom to put back the tool box for her. Annie says "sure" and they hug. "Oh, no!" I thought. "Here comes the hammering episode we all dreamed about and thus predicted! Shout-out to the MBTV 7th Heaven forum chatters! Woo!" But then Lucy leaves and Annie says, "That's my girl!" and I realize that this scene was just filler.
Over at the Bachelor Pad, John's walking in with donuts. Matt's bitching that he can't get a hold of Shana by phone. He says that letting her go to NYU was a big mistake. The guys start doing their not-hilarious little routine in which Matt rants like a cokehead and ignores John snickering at him. Matt decides to go to New York to be with his woman. Ah, young love. Young, deluded, obsessive, stalking-inspiring love. Matt just needs to make some money.
Mary accosts some blonde chick at the lockers and asks her if she's going to work out with Coach Cleary after school. The chick was not asked to do so. Mary immediately blabs about her dream. The chick makes this face like, "Desperate for a plot much?" Mary posits that Coach C was planning to contact this blonde chick for the same reason later in the day. The blonde says she already has something lined up. She's "going to Brown back East." She says she has an academic scholarship "and a grant from the government to document [her] life as a single mom going to college." What the? The frick? On what planet? Hey, man, where's my government freaking grant? I could have documented having morning sickness between classes! No fair! Where's MY scholarship? (Oh, wait -- that's right. I used it to finish off my husband's truck payments right before I went on probation and lost it and dropped out of school. I remember now.) (Just kidding, UT! You know I used it all for books!) Mary merely smiles at her alleged friend's news and doesn't bother to mutter "congratulations" or anything. Her friend hopes Mary's dream comes true. She's like, "I hope your dream comes true. Now excuse me while I get back to the Non-Camden world."
we see RevCam stalking Simon at the junior high. The teacher tells Simon to step outside of class for a "surprise." Simon's all tripped out, wondering if someone died. It turns out that RevCam made arrangements to take Simon out of school and to the movies for a little quality time. Man! Why couldn't MY dad have been a minister who stalked me all the time instead of trying to make money to pay our bills all the time? How come you only took us to the movies on the weekends, Daddy? No wonder we don't have any family values! That's it, dang it. I'm gonna be on a talk show. Simon has a huge pimple on his forehead that's now preserved on film. They tried to cover it with makeup, but you can still see the bump. Poor Simon. No wonder he's so testy.
Matt is rummaging through his parents' basement, looking for stuff to hock so he can end his respite from Shana's life. Annie tries to reason with him. Matt finds a clock. Annie says he can't have it because it was an anniversary gift from RevCam and she's gonna fix it some day and blah blah blah. I think Annie had some work done around her eyes and mouth. The twins are in some sort of large box in the basement. Paging V.C. Andrews! Annie noses around, asking if work or school is too hard for Baby-Waby Mattsky. Matt fumes that he's saving his effort for the hard stuff. Annie says she'll leave him alone, but he can't have her clock. She asks how much he expects to raise by selling the junk. He says a couple of hundred bucks. Annie goes, "Hmm. Maybe Shana can meet you in Kansas?" Oh, that's way harsh. What's harsher, though, is the fact that she goes upstairs and leaves the twins in the basement with Matt. They were smiling in this scene, but I'm going to play it safe and call Child Protective Services, anyway. Be right back . . .
Over at the cinema known as "Flicks," RevCam is purchasing two tickets for the last half of The Wild Bunch. First Simon carps about missing the first half. RevCam says they'll stay until the end and then watch the beginning of the showing. The ticket cashier informs him that it's the last showing. Then Simon complains that they've already seen The Wild Bunch. RevCam points out that he shouldn't worry about missing the first half, then. Yeah, really. Like, just get some popcorn and shut up, Simon. I think this scene would have been way funnier if Eric was drunk.
Annie's putting the twins into their Upstairs Cage while Ruthie looks on. Lucy walks in and asks why RevCam took Simon out of school. Annie says they went to the movies, and spoiled Ruthie immediately has to ask why she never gets to take a half day off. Remember, Ruthie, that the town passed an ordinance saying that your face can't be seen outside of school during daylight hours? Annie placates her. She taped the biography of Queen Elizabeth while the kids were at school. Ruthie runs off to watch it. Lucy asks StuporMom if she believes Mary really has a chance at the pros. Annie smiles as she disses Mary's dream. I notice that Annie never says anything important or exciting to her older kids, but when she does speak to them, she either smiles or grimaces haphazardly. Lucy wants something nice to happen for Mary, but she doesn't want Mary to leave home yet because then Lucy would miss her. Selfish Lucy has had her eyebrows arched and darkened.
Matt's at a fleamarket booth with his hunk of junk. Some woman in a red bandana and patchwork blouse offers him ten bucks for the whole lot because she needs his booth space. Matt declines. She tells him that he might make $20 if he hangs out until closing time. Instead of telling her to get off his back, Matt says he'll hang out until closing time. You want to know what he's selling, don't you? Okay. The main draw is a foot-high statue of Alfred E. Neuman in the "what, me worry?" pose. Also featured are a hubcap, a tennis racket, a fuzzy die, a coverless record album, a bottle of bubble solution and one of those little white, square alarm clocks that they used to sell at Walgreen's all the time. There's a red accordion-looking thing, a clear yellow sphere of some sort, and a large wad of clear plastic as well. I don't know how the lady figured he was gonna make twenty bucks. Maybe he'll luck out and find someone who's really into Mad Magazine, though.
Mary and Coach Cleary are walking down some steps outdoors somewhere. The coach is glad Mary could make it out and he wants to surprise her and let her see for herself what the deal is. They get to a court where a bunch of teen chicks are doing basketball drills. One of them turns around, and we see that she most likely has Down's Syndrome as she says, "Here they come!" Mary is introduced to another girl named Molly Connelly who also has Down's Syndrome. Molly's dad, Jack, is a friend of Coach Cleary's. The coach thought Mary might be able to help Molly & Team get ready for the Special Olympics. Molly hugs Mary for a long time and Mary just smiles as Mr. Connelly and the coach happily look on.
It's obvious that the promo for the movie Where The Heart Is was designed to appeal to trailer-trash housewives like myself, because the marketers know that I'm recapping this time slot. Everyone knows that I am the online trailer housewife specialist, right? I might have to go see the movie. It seems to be the poor woman's Steel Magnolias.
Back on the sidewalk in front of Flicks, RevCam starts to wax nostalgic about men, life, purposes, and cowboys. Simon rudely interrupts to point out that the fleamarket's open. Of course they head over and stop right at Matt's booth. Simon picks up a Crawford U. sweatshirt and suggests buying it for Matt, who is hiding under the table. The nosy woman at the neighboring booth bellows, "Hey, Doc! You got a customer!" and the gig is up. Now there's a silver tinsel garland on the table. "Is there something you want to tell me?" RevCam asks him. Nosy Bandana says, "He's working his way through med school!" Get a life, lady. I'll give you two bucks for that flashy gold lamp. RevCam thought he was the one paying Matt's way through med school. Matt explains his hair-brained, cock-eyed, greasy-haired scheme. RevCam will talk to Matt later. Matt supposes it's because their dad has to have his après-Wild-Bunch talk with Simon now. RevCam asks how much Matt wants for his sweatshirt. Matt tells him $15, which is half of what Eric paid the first time he bought it. Nosy Bandana rolls her eyes. RevCam tosses the shirt on the table, saying, "You're not gonna get fifteen bucks for that." Ha. It would've been funnier without the intrusion of the Lighthearted Acoustic Guitar. Maybe there are people who can't laugh without it, though. Nosy Bandana waves the ten-dollar bill at Matt, who tells her to forget it. Yeah, lady. Matt's not desperate enough to be your gigolo yet.
Contrived Conversation time! Mary and Lucy sit in their room yakking about their futures. All you need to know is that Annie walks in just in time to hear Lucy say, "I have a lot in common with Mom, but I'm not Mom and I don't want to be Mom. Well -- not just Mom." D'oh! Annie is quite wounded. There's a heavy silence. Then Annie goes, "'Just Mom' left her laundry basket." She picks up said basket and hauls ass out the door. Lucy and Mary make uh-oh faces at each other. Okay, now this is interesting. It's about time they addressed the girls' feelings towards Annie's stay-at-home-mom-ed-ness.
At some restaurant, RevCam is telling an unappreciative Simon the story of his life. You want to hear it, don't you? Okay. Eric's dad, The Colonel, didn't cough up any college money because he was hoping Eric would "crack" and go into the Marines. Young Eric entered a seminary in New York instead. The Colonel wanted Eric to enlist and fight in Vietnam. "Wait -- you're not gonna tell me you dodged the draft, are you?" Simon cuts in. Eric explains that there was a drafting lottery. He told himself that the outcome would be a sign from God. The lottery let him out of the draft and Eric felt God wanted him to be a minister. "Is that the end of the story?" asks Simon, who makes a resigned face when RevCam continues. Young Eric dredged up the guts to tell The Colonel that he'd entered the seminary. The Colonel surprised him by merely instructing him to be a good minister. Simon chuckles and asks again if that's the end of the story. "No. It should have been . . ." says Eric. He starts trying to have a revelation. He's wondering if The Colonel was issuing a challenge instead of just expressing acceptance. He's wondered whether God actually "performs signs" for anyone on request. Simon breaks it down for him: "If you don't believe in signs, maybe that high draft number didn't mean anything and you're really not supposed to be a minister. Maybe it just meant that you lucked out and you didn't have to sign up." Eric ponders this wryly as the Lighthearted Acoustic Guitar takes us into the scene.
Matt gets home and melodramatically tells John that he only made $20, which isn't enough for a visit to the Big Apple. Matt says, "You can't even buy a book about New York for twenty bucks." He says that in the old days, going to another city and showing up at a woman's doorstep might have been considered romantic, but today it's considered a felony. John's just working the crowd this week, isn't he? Matt says, "I'm not stalking Shana." Matt, face the truth. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Matt doesn't want to break up with Shana and throw away the two years they spent together. John makes him admit that Shana's already told him to see other people. He suggests that Matt take a break and take some time for himself. That's right, Matt. Do the Kelly Taylor and choose you! John leaves, saying something about finding his parents to thank them for all the advice they ever gave him. Or something. I lost interest because he wasn't holding a donut this time. Matt dials Shana's number, and some guy wearing too much eye makeup and rouge answers the phone and tells Matt that Shana and Brett are at the library. "The library? On a Friday night at midnight?" says Matt. The guy lashes back with, "Look -- I don't know how the libraries are at those little colleges in America's villages, but here at the big universities in the big cities, the libraries are open till 2 AM." Whoa, that was cold-blooded! Lame Matt says to tell Shana he's coming to the big city. He adopts a yokel accent and says, "I wanna see what all them big buildings look like and take a ride on that underground train." The guy who's wearing almost as much makeup as the lead singer for Human League says, "No problem," and hangs up. Matt makes his super-mad, supposed-to-be-comic face, then looks at his small pile of small bills and rolls his eyes.
RevCam finds Annie bawling over her old clock. She doesn't want to be "just mom." She tells RevCam that he has what people consider a real job and that he shouldn't let Simon get to him. He says she shouldn't let Lucy get to her. They wonder when the kids' opinions became more important than their own.
Mary's in her room, on the phone with Molly. Molly self-consciously asks if Mary will practice with her the day. They make plans and then Molly says Mary's her hero. "No, I'm not. Believe me, I'm nobody's hero," demurs Mary as Lucy looks on. But, Mary, what about all the girls you've inspired to pose nude for gentlemen's mags? You're a hero to them!
"Dr. Pepper makes the world taste better"? The hell? I could have come up with a better slogan while playing bingo online with one hand tied behind my back.
We get to see Ruthie's stupid dream of being a queen. She's walking down a red carpet with two dogs on leashes. People wave. Ruthie's crown looks like the one from the Imperial margarine commercials. Simon wakes her. She thinks her dream will come true. Simon doubts it. Happy barks twice in this scene.
Lucy is trying to talk to Annie, who doesn't want to hear her excuses. Ruthie walks in and says she doesn't want to be "just mom" either. She wants to be the Queen. A twin says, "Ah oh." Annie asks what Ruthie saw on the biography that made her think she wanted to be Queen. Ruthie spouts some crap about castles and such. Annie tells her to finish watching the tape. She says, "You should do a lot of research on someone before you decide you want to be them [sic]. Or before you decide you don't want to be them [sic again]." This last is said with a guilt-trip-inducing glance at Lucy.
The doorbell rings. It's Molly and her dad. Molly hugs Mary. Mr. Connelly tells us that he's off to the driving range to meet Coach Cleary. He then wants to make sure that his daughter's welcome to hang with Mary, because Molly was confused about something Mary said on the phone. "Why didn't you want to be my hero?" Molly asks Mary. (This is getting to be like a tongue-twister or a children's poem, isn't it?) Mary says she doesn't deserve to be a hero. She explains that she hasn't had a great year. "I'm aware of that. Maybe you're being a little too hard on yourself," says Mr. Connelly. Uh, okay, buddy. Maybe you should quit gossiping about your friend's students. Mary just smiles her lip-glossy smile. Mr. Connelly leaves.
Simon goes into the den/study-thingie and tells his mom he's ready to walk Happy. Annie suggests he talk to RevCam first. Simon moans that he talked to his dad all day. Annie scolds Simon for not getting enough out of the conversation. Simon is surprised to learn that his flippant attitude had such an effect on RevCam. Annie tells him that he's a young man, not a little boy, and what he says matters now. Simon goes to find his dad.
Contrived As Well As Incredibly Stupid Scene time. Matt's working at the hospital cafeteria. John shows up on some pretense and ascertains that Matt still hasn't been able to inform Shana of his imminent visit. Then he takes off and some older guy in a cafeteria-worker uniform walks up, offering to relieve Matt for a while. Matt introduces himself. The guy, Jake, claims he's been working at the hospital for thirty-nine years as some sort of menial jack-of-all-trades. Then we get a long sob-story about how Jake wanted to be a doctor, but he put off his studies because blah blah blah and then he got married and blah blah and when I woke up, Matt was excusing himself to long-distance-stalk Shana on the payphone.
Simon finds his dad sulking in Ruthie's playhouse. He apologizes and explains that he doesn't feel he'd make a good minister. He manages to turn the situation into a major brown-nosing opportunity. He wouldn't be as good as RevCam, and he couldn't sermonize about God in church because God is so close to his heart and it would make him "weepy." Yeah, good one, Simon. You forgot to add, "And I heard they don't let you drink at the non-Catholic seminaries." Okay, so that subplot's over.
Lucy tries to talk to her mom again. Annie still isn't having it. Ruthie runs in and babbles that the Queen didn't have to go to school. Annie tells her to keep watching and Ruthie runs out again. Then it's time for the Female Camden Heart-To-Heart segment of the show. Lucy says that Annie's smart and lovable and all, but "when you think about it, who wants to be [sic] her own mother?" Annie points out that Lucy's only known her own mother for sixteen years, which is not long enough to know her well, apparently. Annie has dreams. There's much more she wants to do in life. Her life's not over. Let me guess -- you want to hear the dream, don't you? Okay, but don't say I didn't warn you . . . Annie's dream is to start some stupid cooperative for moms at the church. She thought up the scheme when Matt was a baby. The stay-at-home mothers, who are "accused of staying home to bake cupcakes," could babysit the working moms' kids after school. The working mothers, accused of abandoning their kids, could share their skills with the stay-at-home moms or donate money to build a church daycare center. Can I just say "whatever"? I don't know about anyone else, but as a stay-at-home mom myself, I have better things to do than babysit someone else's kids for free in the hopes that I might learn to use spreadsheets or something. It's like, "I really wish all women could get along, but how can I help? I know! I'll share my gifts, which are babysitting and cooking, with the working moms. Then they can share their wondrous knowledge with me! Then they can build a daycare center so that I can continue to care for their children for free in a Christian atmosphere! After all that, they'll like me for sure!!!" I mean, it is true that there's still resentment between the Mom Camps and that there shouldn't be, but this isn't the way to go about solving the problem. Even if I were paid to watch kids other than my own, I wouldn't want to do it. It'd cut into the time that I spend learning Flash while my sons feed themselves dry cereal, darn it!
So anyway, Annie says she doesn't want to tell the dream to RevCam because then she'd have to actually follow through with it. She spits out some schlock about making dreams into reality and knowing the difference between the two. Whatever. While she's saying this, we get a fuzzy close-up of her face that really highlights the shape of her teeth.
After their practice, Mary and Molly chat. Molly innocently reveals that her dad is a scout for the WNBA. Mary gets all happy, because of course she believes that Molly's only purpose in life is to bring to fruition Mary's spur-of-the-moment dream. "Ah ha! So I was right!" says she. Molly tries to go with the flow and remarks, "It's good to be right."
When I get famous, I'm going to befriend Heather Locklear and get the name of her plastic surgeon because s/he does really good work.
Mary runs into her room to tell Lucy that "they're all down there!" The coaches have come over to talk to Mary's parents. Mary is convinced it's because they want her to start playing for the WNBA post-haste. Lucy expresses doubt. This is just like the episode in which Mary and Lucy argue upstairs while the CamRents talk to Robbie downstairs. It's making me yawn.
In the kitchen, Mr. Connelly says he wants his daughter to give the news to Mary. He goes to get Molly from their house or wherever. I wonder why he didn't bring her with him in the first place. Coach Cleary leaves so that the CamRents can be alone with Mary after the bomb is dropped on her.
In the living room, Ruthie turns off the VCR in disgust. She bitches to Simon that the queen of England has to work. She doesn't want to be queen anymore. I don't care. Lucy shows up and says she wants to be Annie when she grows up. "Wanna be? You are Mom," says Simon. Lucy denies it, but then says that if she turns out to be half the woman Annie is, she'll be happy. I guess she could do that by having 3.5 kids and coming up with half of a social reform plan to mull over for years on end. Simon and Ruthie send her to the kitchen to find out what's up with Mary's future.
Matt calls Shana's place. She's at the library again. The glam-rocker who passes for her answering service asks when Matt's bus is getting to town. Matt says something not at all pithy and the guy apologizes, explaining that he dislikes having to answer Matt's extremely frequent calls and give the bad news. He says that Shana has to study a lot because she's in pre-med. Matt asks why this guy is always home to answer the phone, then. Instead of telling Matt to mind his own freaking business, the guy says that he got kicked out of pre-med. Matt insincerely apologizes and tells the poor man's Rob Lowe that he's not going to visit Shana after all. "I think that's best," says This Guy Who Shall Remain Nameless. Like, "Hey, nameless dude, thanks for the free advice! Have you ever thought of forming a co-op for college students and drop-outs?" John's been in the room with Matt the whole time. Matt tells his roommate that he talked to an "old guy" who helped him see the light. Subsequently, Matt signed up to work as an orderly. He accuses John of paying the old guy to show up and tell Matt a fake story. John laughs and asks how Matt knew. Matt asks John to accompany him to the library. After some gentle homosexual flirting play, they get to the door and Matt says, "Pizza?!" So I guess Matt's not actually going to study or anything.
Mary and Lucy debate some more. RevCam announces Molly. Lucy hugs Mary and leaves her to her guest. Molly says, "I think I made a mistake. I make a lot of mistakes." Mary asks what she means, then says, "Oh, no . . . your dad isn't a pro scout?" "No, he is," corrects Molly. Then she asks, "Did I say that he wants you to play pro ball?" Mary prevaricates, "Not in so many words." Molly apologizes for giving Mary that impression, because her dad never said anything about Mary in the WNBA. Self-centered Mary ponders this aloud, wondering why Coach Cleary would have her coach -- "Girls like me," Molly finishes for her. Molly explains that she saw Mary playing basketball at the high school and decided that Mary was her hero and blah blah and I don't know what all else. Mary hugs Molly for the zillionth time.
Mr. Connelly is telling the CamRents that his daughter's very responsible about owning up to her mistakes. The two girls comes downstairs, and Mary tells him that Molly wasn't at fault -- that she jumped to conclusions. Mr. Connelly apologizes, and Molly says it's okay because everyone makes mistakes. Mr. Connelly says Mary has potential and she should play on a college team. Mary and Molly hug aGAIN. Mary tells her parents that she knows she'll have to work harder to make her dreams come true. She kisses them and runs upstairs. This was the biggest deal made of nothing I've seen all month.
Annie says she wants to tell RevCam about a dream she's had for years. RevCam says he talked to Simon and that "the flip side of doubt is faith," whatever that means. We see that Annie's clock is working now. Since Annie herself is still worthless, I don't know what the metaphor's supposed to mean.
I didn't get the scenes for week's episode because I was busy coughing up bile. Sorry! I'll try harder time! Everyone makes mistakes! The flip side of doubt is faith!