All Alan, Alda Time

For some reason, Alan Alda pays regular visits to my dreamscape.

Well, it's not completely random; M*A*S*H* was omnipresent throughout my childhood.

In fact, I was named after Benjamin "Hawkeye" Pierce, which, subconsciously, is probably one of the reasons why I rarely use my real name anymore.

Nonetheless, I've been a huge fan of the M*A*S*H* multiverse for most of my life.

I still remember the fervor surrounding the final episode, even though I was in 3rd grade. It was one of the only times besides "dinner time" that all 6 members of my household were voluntarily in the same room with each other.

Watching that final episode was the catalyst for my personal M*A*S*H* fandom.

I started absorbing the TV series through re-runs, and then I discovered that the show was based on a movie, which was based on a book. This was before my family had a VCR, so seeing the movie was virtually impossible, even if my parents would have let me watch it (I was 7 years old, after all).

That summer, I was permitted to read the original novel, by Richard Hooker. It was nothing like the TV show, except for some of the central characters. It was also really hard to understand, even for a precocious third-grader like me. For instance, there's a part where one of the doctors wants to commit suicide because he became spontaneously impotent. I'll never forget asking my dad what is going on in that scene, what the word "impotent" means, etc, because it led to my dad fumbling through a pre-mature crash course in "the birds and the bees."

I finally saw the film a few years later, which is still one of my Top 10 favorite movies of all time. Robert Altman directs, Donald Sutherland plays Hawkeye, Elliot Gould plays Trapper John, it's got Robert Duvall... Altman's M*A*S*H* follows close to the original novel, and it's a very dark, almost non-linear film that introduced a lot of cutting-edge cinematic devices to mainstream film-making. It's a truly fantastic movie.

So, as the film is based on the book, the TV show was based on the film. But the television M*A*S*H* features an alternate universe, if you will. They cut a few major characters out completely, ret-conned Frank Burns, and the remaining central characters are much more socially redeeming than their cinematic counterparts.

Anyway, as I became more aware of the M*A*S*H* multiverse, I was drawn back to the original novel. I then discovered that the novel had 13 literary sequels, which followed the original characters on various adventures after the Korean War ended. Of course, I own them all.

The sequels vary in quality, but they're interesting in how they establish yet another tangential, parallel M*A*S*H "reality."

Now, why the fuck did I start writing about this again?

Oh right- Alan Alda shows up in my dreams pretty regularly- not all the time, but consistently.

Here are two random "dream journal" excerpts involving Alan Alda:

-Last night, I had a dream that I was at some sort of social gathering and Alan Alda was there. So was another cast member of MASH, but I can’t remember who. I thought that I should alert Alan of this other MASH alumni, but for some reason, I just couldn’t get close to him. Any time I tried to get near him to talk, something would happen and I would be foiled, although I can’t remember exactly what. I just remember being frustrated. Then suddenly Alan seemed like he was my dad, or somebody my dad was friends with or related to. It was like “there’s Alan Alda, and he is a member of my family.” Like, I knew him personally via my dad. They both have the same sort of crinkly, twinkly eyes when they smile.

There was a spiral staircase, too, but I can’t remember anything else.

-Another Alan Alda dream, kind of. I am in somebody’s living room, with wood paneled walls and a beige carpet. There is a sliding glass door which leads to the outside, and a black entertainment system cabinet with a TV against the wall. It’s nighttime, and it seems like I am at a sleepover party, because I am sitting on a couch (also beige) in my pajama bottoms and an old red T-shirt with a sheet over me. Everybody else is in sleep clothes like sweatpants and stuff, and their are three or four guys I don’t recognize, and this guy Jake who I used to be in a band with. Jake is lighting black-cat firecrackers and throwing them at me. I tell him to stop and he doesn’t, and finally I get up and cover his head with the sheet and twist it around his neck like a tourniquet and start strangling him and yelling “Say You’re Sorry!”. Even though I’m using all my might in strangling him, he is kind of laughing through the sheet and saying “No Way!” so I start twisting harder and finally he relents and apologizes. So I release him and he’s all pissed and calls me an asshole. Then he throws a pack of Bambu rolling papers at me, and it is apparent that I gave them to him at some point in the past as a token of friendship. I pick them up and see that a piece of the cover has been ripped off as if somebody made a makeshift filter

for one of those European style spliffs. I put them in my pocket, because suddenly I'm wearing brown corduroys and a light blue T-shirt, and I go outside through the glass door. Then I'm at what seems to be a high school keg party, but something awful has happened. Some sort of explosion or something, there are people everywhere screaming and all bloody and dead and mangled on the lawn and floating in the pool.

I am deliriously wasted; in the dream I feel drunk or tripping, and I can’t decide if what I’m seeing is real. A girl named Jenny who I used to have the hots for in high school is ripped apart like this dead possum I saw when I was five years old and used to give me nightmares. A boy named Jeff who was in many of my classes in high school is lying on the ground, but doesn’t seemed injured. He tells me that he saw a dead frog and the frog’s blood was green, and I called him a liar and he playfully says he’s not, and then I realize that he must have severe internal injuries and he is about to die, so I humor him and say that, yes, it’s true that frogs have green blood.

That’s when Alan Alda suddenly appears. He just kind of walks around the corner of the house, and when I notice him, I notice that there is a rescue team that has set up a first-aid tent next to the pool. He says “I’m Alan Alda, what can I do to help?” I am dumbfounded, but when I look into his eyes and see how passionate he is, I snap out of it and point him to Jeff. Jeff is dead, but he has a smile on his face. I feel like it would be convenient to pass out, and in the dream it feels like I am actually making myself go to sleep, and then Alan puts his hand on my shoulder. I can feel the hand but my eyes are closed. I remember deciding that it was worth it to wake up because he is Alan Alda and he needs my help, and when I make myself wake up in the dream I actually woke up in real life.

my collection of MASH novels