“martin prince sings summer wind”
remember that episode of the simpsons
back when
it was a rip-rollicking
cultural tour de force
in its white hot prime
in the middle of the 90s
it’s the episode
where the simpsons get a pool
and bart breaks his leg
and does the whole vertigo
murder parody with flanders
the ending to that episode
is as emotionally arresting
as homer staring
at the starry firmament
after saying goodbye
to his mother
or “do it for her”
maybe more so
martin prince,
the fat little probably-gay nerd
in bart’s class
with his hair perfectly parted
gets a pool of his own
and temporarily becomes popular
paralleling lisa’s own plot arc
earlier in the episode
but too many kids jump into the pool
and it comically breaks apart
and everyone leaves
stranding martin in the summer sunset
naked after being pantsed by bully
nelson muntz
martin accepts his fate and stands there
among the wet wreckage of his pool
buck naked and feeling
the “gentle caress of the summer breeze”
on his buttcheeks
the episode could’ve ended there
but it doesn’t
instead
a lamenting jazz swing wafts in on the soundtrack
and martin sings the opening lines to sinatra’s
classic “summer wind”
and as he does so the camera retreats
up and up and up into the northeast
giving us a lovely scenic panorama
of martin’s neighborhood
with an orange rind of a sun
dipping below the horizon
leaving the chubby little nerd
alone
in his backyard
to contemplate his loneliness
the scene is so out of nowhere
the rest of the episode had no other moments like this
and for some fucking reason it gets me right in the feelies
more than any other moment
in this godsend of a cartoon sitcom
that episode is nearly a quarter century old
and it still gives me pause
even just as a thought
russi taylor (RIP) did a great job singing those lines
the performance is just competent enough
to stick the emotional landing
i don’t know if the moment was supposed to be funny
or wistful or both but it only strikes me as incurably
sad
maybe, for me, i see the innocent years of my life
disappearing over that horizon in the wide shot
i feel like all sorts of things were left behind
in that moment
it’s a nostalgia flood
and i can’t explain why,
just one of those things
