Let it snow...   (23.12.12)
  

   It's the Sunday before Christmas and I am stretched upon the sofa,
   relaxed, absently channel-hopping, as Channel4's snowy promo 
   catches my eye... "The Snowman and The Snowdog".. and I am
   stirred. I haven't really thought about the enormity of their arrival...
   TVC, returning to the magic font... And as the camera circles and the
   characters take flight, I am drawn to those shimmering figures...
   my eye roving inbetween those beguiling crosshatched hues as...
   like magic... time shifts around me and I find myself cast back
   through the years!...

   I am thirteen again. And I am in love. Again. Thirteen is an unsettled
   age. I am still discovering my place in the universe and my unstable
   emotions lead me to embrace all manner of new and exciting
   affectations, from day to day. I am currently smitten with Mr
   Raymond Briggs. Not the real-life artist, of course, for I have not
   met him. But his creations, Fungus the glorious green Bogeyman
   and that great grump Father Christmas. These creations are with
   me almost every waking hour. They inspire me to map out stories
   of my own. To tell not comic book stories, but something
   more... something altogether more sophisticated... Of course, I am
   not yet aware of the term "graphic novel", but I am magnificently
   aware that Mr Briggs' storytelling style stands apart from anything
   else I have yet encountered...
   
   We shift again.. And here's "The Snowman"... a story, landing in
   my lap, silently, wordlessly, with a new character to hero-worship.
   And that elegant encounter, sad but not sad, uplifting and yet so
   very devastating... and my appreciation and fascination jumps to
   another level...

   Another shift... a precise moment now... Christmas 1982...
   and I can feel myself alighting in front of the family television in
   my dressing gown, brimming with anticipation... "The Snowman"
   an animated half-hour receiveing its premiere... I am greatly
   concerned.. My precious character, my precious story ... will
   they hold up in the translation, for they are snowflakes, so fleeting...
   so very fragile... And then...

   The restless beauty of it all!... And the music!.. I recall every note
   to this day... every high and every low of Howard Blake's score...
   The exploration!... The bike ride!... The aerial flight!.. They cascade
   upon me and I am soaring and swooping all the way to the North
   Pole... only to be overwhelmed by the total devastation of that final
   frozen image...

   Oh, yes! - The emotions surge within me, unchecked, and just as
   they engulf me I am back. I am upon my sofa once more and time
   has surely stood still, for the promo is only now concluding...
   "The Snowman and The Snowdog",  8.00pm, Christmas Eve...
   The time and date are now etched upon the screen and in my mind,
   and I know with absoloute certainty, come the hour, I shall turn
   into a boy again... I shall become my younger self... willing the
   film to succeed...

   I hope. I hope. I hope...

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