There was a time in my life several years ago when I was slightly depressed, nothing dramatic, just a vague grey feeling that seemed to hover around me throughout the day. Like the feeling just before you get a cold when you have no energy and you feel a little lonely but it's too much work to call up a friend, that's how I felt for a couple of years. At that time I worked at home and my days were fairly quiet. I got in the habit of watching Perry Mason reruns during my lunch hour everyday. I found these shows oddly comforting. The comradery between Perry, Della and Paul, the high contrast black and white photography, the look of LA in the late fifties/early sixties, all this appealed to me. I even liked the cheesy ads for personal injury attornies and computer job training that played at the breaks. I loved the hopelessly dated depictions of beatnicks and psychiatry. I loved seeing actors before they got famous taking the stand to be politely reamed, or wildly overacting in the denouement. But mostly I loved Perry.

Oh how I love him
Perry Mason
And I don't know why
I got to see him
And I don't know why

In early episodes Perry was thin, still smoked, and called Della "Miss Street", but in later ones he was plump and treated Della like a trusted friend instead of an employee. I never grew tired of the look on Hamilton Burger's face when once again Perry defeated him by ferreting out the real culprit with the vaguest of clues. As my Perry Mason habit increased I found I'd get a bit anxious that my one o'clock clients might show up early, causing me to miss the conclusion. I began to make them wait. Soon I discovered that channel 20 showed Perry three times a day: noon, 7pm and 1am. I started turning down dinner dates so I wouldn't miss the evening show. Friends stopped calling during "Perry" times, knowing I wouldn't answer. Sometimes I'd have a boyfriend over and I'd stop whatever we were doing at 1am and make him watch Perry with me. Weekends, when he wasn't shown, were difficult. . . I realized I was getting, well, maybe just a bit obsessed.

Oh how I love him
Perry Mason
Perry, I'm losing it

I'd acquired a reputation. People smiled and looked away when I spoke of him. I didn't care. And it wasn't a sexual thing, either, I never had lustful thoughts about him. Besides, I'd heard for years that Raymond Burr was gay. But Perry was there, in focus, in hard-edged black and white three times a day, more reliable than any boyfriend. And he was kind, even with the most exasperating people. Life is chaos but Perry is reliable, honest, and never ever wrong. At the end of each show when the world was in order again Perry and his co-horts would always be laughing in some restaurant, that's were I belonged. And I know he'd like me, I wouldn't be some addled client, he'd see the brains and goodness in me. Like Abe Lincoln, like Atticus Finch. The perfect father. I can never turn him off.

Oh how I love him
Perry Mason