Natasha Luepke

Sometimes I picture my parents on a bench at the beach in the bright sunshine. Waikiki. The portion of beach by the police station and the man who rents inner tubes. My parents sit on a bench facing the street so they can partake in their favorite activities: people watching and being together. Midwesterners at heart, Daddy wears jeans and a short-sleeved red plaid shirt, his transition lenses hiding his eyes but not his smile. Mom wears a light blue denim dress and big sunglasses, big purse on her lap.

The denim clothing is fine in the Hawaiian sun because this picture is not real, and never can be. I love Waikiki and have been several times, but Mom only saw the Pacific ocean for the first time a few months before she died, and my dad not at all. Sometimes I just like to think of them happy in a place where I have been happy.

My father died in 2001, and while my mother died eight years later, she never recovered from losing him. I was effectively an orphan at 18, and a literal one at 26. They left me a complicated legacy of love, mental illness, anger, and laughter. Dad died before we really got to knew each other. Mom and I had always been close and shared many interests, but our roles flipped that day in April 2001, and then we grew apart, basically estranged, then a brief reconciliation, then her death.

I am a millennial and had a third parent: television. We had cable. I watched everything. Mom and Dad loved comedy, and I grew up with SNL, SCTV, Monty Python. And like many millennials, these actors became another regular presence in my life.

Catherine O’Hara was the same age as my mom; Eugene Levy just a few years younger than my dad.

Of course I was enthralled by Schitt’s Creek. My Canadian comedy parents, playing actual parents.

And of course I found the show very funny and touching, I loved the quirky characters and performances, loved the supportive LGBTQ messaging. I felt it all very deeply.

But for me, what hit me most, was the relationship between the parents and their adult children.

Dan Levy is just four months older than I am. Obviously we had very different upbringings, but I bet we had many of the same cultural touchstones. (We had cable, after all!) The Elephant Show. Kids in the Hall. Plus the usual millennial/xennial/elder millennial/geriatric millennial stuff. Just a weird parasocial kinship on my part.

The Roses are forced together, and amidst the wacky storylines, they also reckon with their past family dynamics. They care about each other but they only bounced around in each other’s lives.

Because it’s a comedy show, there’s no grand scene of the family hashing it out, though we get little glimpses. (“No one cares, David!” Alexis exclaims. “I care!” he retorts, laying out his years of worry.) The parents admit their mistakes, maybe not literally, but through action, which is more important anyway.

So that tangled mess of fiction and family took root in my brain. “Let’s just put the past behind us,” my mother said; we hadn’t spoken in months, and she would be dead in a few more. I agreed, because I was 25 and about to propose to my boyfriend and I wanted my mommy.

Nothing was really resolved, and I think we would have broken apart again. My resentments were too great. My mother refused to take her own recovery seriously. For a long time, I could only imagine a “what might have been” that was sad and dark, arguments and silence.

But Schitt’s Creek gave me hope, a better vision of a future that cannot be. Two people who deeply loved each other even after forty years. I can question many things about my life, but I can never question my own parents’ devotion. Parents who were well-intentioned but limited, working on strengthening their relationship with their children. Adult children realizing they can grow and change. 

David is gutted when Moira explains she was behind the “success” of his art gallery. She thought she was being supportive. And I felt that, too. Not that my mom would literally buy all the paintings in my gallery (or whatever), but that kind of hurtful “support.” Don’t you see how much I care, even if it destroys you?!

Patrick serenading David, and Moira tearing up about her baby boy. Gentle and healing. Catherine O’Hara, a comedic powerhouse but could be tender, too. Maybe that could have been my actual mom, too. Mom who didn’t just tolerate or play along, but came to understand, to fully support, not just performatively.

Mom always smiled indulgent when I talked about my little interests. “She didn’t start talking until she was two, and then she never shut up!” was a common joke in my family. The other day, I was texting my husband and said I was “all talked out.” And I thought of my mother’s comment in my mother’s voice; I almost made some kind of joke over text, like “I know that’s hard to believe!” Even now, if I’m just reacting and not thinking, I see our relationship as it was when it effectively ended in 2001.

But I try to keep retraining my brain (“re-parent myself,” my therapist called it), and Schitt’s Creek is part of that. Our relationship didn’t have to stay stagnant and stuck. Maybe, maybe, Mom and I could have found a way back to each other. I could and can and do grow and change, and my mother could, too.

In that fantasy on the beach, my fantasy of denim-clad parents on a bench, the three of us are not together. They smile and tell me they will see me later as I head to the ABC Store for spam musubi. But I could come back and they could still be there. And we could have had a better future.