a moment in the day: sherlock

"This episode has gone off the rails," I say when we pause the show to duck into the kitchen for seconds on dinner.

As I scoop and microwave and pour, Stephen is talking about how he remembers from the first time we watched the series, back in the summer of 2020, that it starts out fun and then goes increasingly off the rails. I remember that during that first time around, I enjoyed the show overall more than he did, that I tolerated, and at times enjoyed, the over-the-topness and progressive ludicrousness way better than he had.

This particular episode is off the charts off the rails, with preposterous twists and overblown adventure sequences and a gathering cruelty in the plot that, instead of being entertaining, just makes us both feel squirmy and disturbed. I think if not for my insistence that we see the series through, and maybe the beautiful, odd charisma of Andrew Scott, Stephen would have switched to something else long ago.

We get our seconds and head back to the bedroom. Settle in. Press play again and the action continues. And when the strains of that delicious soundtrack swoop in, I could almost cry with longing. 

This second binge of Sherlock is about to be over, and I don't want it to be over. Because back in the summer of 2020, my dad was still in this world. And through all his struggles with the cancer, I was talking to him on the phone every day. Stephen and I were watching Sherlock and he and my mom were watching Elementary, the other modern Sherlock Holmes TV series. I would tell Dad he should watch Sherlock and he would tell me I should watch Elementary. And in the end, neither of us did either. We never had time to make that swap and talk about the shows the other of us knew better. 

But just the talking that we did do, about the thing the other of us hadn't yet experienced, was enough that now, four years later (can it really be four years later?), all I feel, while I'm watching Holmes and Watson do their thing, is him.