Here Are the Most Relatable Scenes from ‘The Simpsons’

In its nearly 35 years on the air, The Simpsons has hit so close to home so many times that even the show’s writers can’t help but feel that Reverend Lovejoy’s model train passengers can see a sad man on the other side of the screen as well.

When Matt Groening originally designed the first family of Fox animation back in the late 1980s, he based Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie Simpson on his own family growing up, as shown in the characters’ names — Homer and Margaret were the Christian names of Groening’s father and mother, and Lisa and Maggie are his two younger sisters. Groening settled on calling the hell-raising oldest son “Bart” because it was an anagram of the word “brat,” and because it would be a little too self-involved for the Simpsons creator to name the coolest character after himself. 

And so, with Groening’s very DNA woven into the foundation of The Simpsons, it’s no surprise that the show is enduringly personal — sometimes a little too personal, as veteran Simpsons staff writer Josh Weinstein recently pointed out.

In a now-viral thread, Weinstein revealed that the scene from the classic Simpsons Season Six episode “Bart’s Girlfriend” in which a dejected Reverend Lovejoy dons his conductor’s hat and plays the saddest game of pretend with his model train set is, in the writer’s opinion, one of the most relatable scenes in the history of The Simpsons. Weinstein went on to invite his followers and all Simpsons fans to post their own top Simpsons scenes, quotes and jokes that hit a little too close to home.

Here are some of the highlights to split your heart in half like you’re Ralph Wiggum…