Lessons Learned?

My favorite Star Trek Series is Deep Space Nine.  One of the characters that made it such a joy to watch, was Mr. Garak.  As a former spy, now exiled on an alien space station with the Federation in power, he forms an unlikely friendship with the straight laced Doctor Bashir. 

One day, Dr. Bashir explains to him why no one trusts his advice or stories by telling the tale of the Boy Who Cried Wolf. 

Mr. Garak asks if the moral of the story is what Dr. Bashir claims it to be, "Be honest."  Dr. Bashir asks, "What do you think the moral is?"   He answers, "Never tell the same lie twice." 

So when my daughter asked me, "What is the moral of Disney's The Little Mermaid?"  I had to consider, what did I want the lesson to be? 

I asked my friends on the internet, and gathered their wisdom, so without further adieu, I present to you, the top ten lessons that should be learned from Disney's "A Little Mermaid."

10) Never trust anyone with a creepy familiar(s).  

9) Learn Sign Language.

8) If your first act of adulthood involves selling your soul, mutilating your body and renouncing all the collective wisdom of your family and people, you better hope everyone comes to your rescue because this is not a good decision on your part. 

7) Crustaceans make lousy "in loco parentis." 

6) If the guy can't figure out it's you without your singing...maybe...you want someone smarter. 

5) If the girl combs her hair with a fork...maybe...you want someone smarter. 

4) Catchy tunes can make people forget your lack of character,  (See Ursula, Dr. Facilier, and Gaston).  

3) If the dog likes a character, this is a good person, marry her. If the dog doesn't like a person, that person must be a villain in disguise, attack and kill.  

2) You can marry all you wish, but few survive parenthood in a Disney universe. King Triton is a single dad monarch, and Prince Eric, an orphan for some time.   Sebastian is a singleton, Flounder seems to have no family, and Ursula, seems to have some relationship with Triton, maybe an evil Aunt or Sister, but there are no complete families anywhere.  You've been warned. 

1) Always read the fine print. 

And Now the Not News

Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be Miley.

By now, the whole world knows this Disney Princess has chosen to out Gaga gaga, both in dress and style. I'd add substance but I'm not sure we've got enough to qualify in either case.  Both recall Madonna, the performer who for all her flash and dance, revealed herself to have the "heart and soul of a cash register." That description is a remembered one from some scribe back in the 80's opining about the material girl who aped Marilyn Monroe. I googled but couldn't find the exact quote to give full credit. However, the point remains that all three of these women were in the business of selling music as sex and sex as music and themselves as the icon of both.  It's just that Miley only recently jumped into the sharknado.  She's doing what she can to ensure everyone forgets Hanna Montana.  She is Sandra Dee of Grease at the end of the movie, because she wants to be popular and current and she, like so many of her generation, is both bored with her life as is, and desperate to be relevant.  

Then again, this was the Music awards so is the surprise that she was so lewd or that it was her?  What gives me hope, is that apparently, the entertainment world can still be shocked.   Here you have people who thrive on creating buzz, whose whole world is get your name known, your brand known, your face known, get people to talk about you you you you you you you.  Here, a young woman has taken that challenge to heart.

This is the lesson of Hollywood, of the Vanity Business that is Stardom for Stardom's sake.

You will be forgotten if you do not make people notice you.  You lack the beauty, grace, capacity to get people to notice you, so you must be more than you.  Cue airbrush, hair weaves, botox, facelifts, radical diets, insane outfits, etc. etc. etc.  You cannot be normal if you want to be noticed.  You cannot be you if you want to be a star. You must be something other, because you as is, is not star worthy, is not enough.

This is the messsage drilled into every model, every singer, every performer's head, that whoever they are, they are inadequate want-a-bes, until they are a star, then, they are it, however that "itness" is fragile, it is not a secure orbit.  The stars become inadequate once they age, then they become hasbeens.

Come to think of it, it was the message of Hanna Montana too.  She couldn't be both the singer and herself, they had to be two different people to allow for a normal life.   However eventually, the lure of fame and desire to be affirmed in all things won out and she disclosed her identity, so that she could be just the pop star.   Now we add hard core to the formula.  Hard core being the in case of emergency, push this red button means of restarting yourself in the Hollywood world.

The message over and over again for years, "You will not be loved, you will only be used." left a scar.
We saw that scar gyrating on the stage --or read about it.

Our nature requires love.  If we cannot be loved, we will be hungry, we will seek to fill that hole with something.  Miley had everything and she was still full of need.  Perpetually we see it, child to adult celebrities do not understand need. They've never had to cope with needing. No need to list the Disney divas that have fallen before her.  They all share the same inability to cope with anything other than the unreal world of fame, and the hardness of that unreal world not satisfying. That sort of profound isolation and lack of connection, to themselves and anyone else, must be unbearable.   The pattern of these women indicates, it eventually leads to fleeing --Madonna away from the spotlight for years, or destruction a.la. Lindsay Lohan.

One could almost see the crazed thinking that went into this decision.  The something she needed must be something outside of what she had. She has everything, but she still needs, so she must need MORE, more fame, more notice.  How to get more?  This need is awful.  I need it to be fixed fast! How to get the MORE fast?

The child star became the porn poll dancer, everything real burnt away in favor of something other than the self, something of a naked mask that is caked in stage makeup and eyeliner and spandex.  It is a cartoonish almost demonic re-envisioning of the performer that she was, self loathing even as it self promoted.  It was foolish and it succeeded.  She has more.  People are talking about her, about her performance, about her transformation, about her act and actions.   All press is good press if fame is the goal.  Infamy works as well as anything.  It worked for Madonna and Lady Gaga...and sadly, for Miley too.  Today.  

But this sort of need is never fed by More of the wrong thing.  So Miley will try again, to capture that moreness that made her start down this road in the first place.  Worse for her, one day, she will try everything she can think of and that moreness will still not fill what is wrong.  Some day, someone will out Miley Miley, for the same reasons she outdid Lady Gaga, and she will wonder, when she grew old and why? And there will be a great emptiness that howls far louder in her heart than any buzz she won from the other night.  

Moments of Perfection

We did the epic.  We took all ten children to Disneyworld. 

Despite long debates and agreement that breaking the groups into two and tailoring the experience to the ages involved, we ultimately wanted this to be a family vacation and so we all went together.  We dressed alike, had assigned partners and switched off often. 

Here were the moments that acted as a photograph in my mind, of the experience. 

Regina's sly smile became a wide mouthed grin as she saw the princesses dancing at the castle. 

Rita's euphoric "I'm driving! I'm driving! Faster Mom! I'm just like a teenager." (editorial note, she's almost as good but that shout has made me consider the possibility that she shouldn't be liscenced until she's 18).

Anna Maria in "It's a Small World." Up until that point, she'd shook her head "No." to everything, but this was the ride that began to uncurl her from thinking this world was just too unreal for her sensibilities.

Getting completely drenched top to bottom with six of my children --not from the ride of Splash Mountain, but from the rain which started falling with a vengeance during Splash Mountain.  We all started laughing. They did warn us, we might get wet. 

Marta going into the sweet shop to buy her sister a rice crispy treat when the samples got devoured before she got one. 

William lifting his brother John up onto his shoulders so he could see the electric light parade. 

Bonnie playing with her younger siblings and really helping them experience Disney. She lifted up Regina to look out the ferry so she could see the final parade on the lake surrounding the Magic Kingdom.

Faith and John driving by themselves on the speedway.  Both felt very important and proud.

Peter going on multiple rollercoasters (twice). 

My beloved husband shouting out in surprised joy at the fireworks.  They were lovely.

Paul wanting to hold both his dad's and my hand during the laser show. He got that this was a communal experience, that it should be, and that this was a perfect moment to be cherished. He was right. 
 

Disney and Me

When my family went to Disney World, my father didn't like it. He felt annoyed at Epcot Center and the various mock ups of cultures most of all. “It’s like the world without God, sex or vegetables,” he complained. We kids rolled our eyes and offered him some of the better fare found in the Italian section. “Relax Dad, it’s fun.”

Flash forward a few years and we took a family vacation to Vegas. “Well Dad, here they have the sex and the vegetables.” I joked. I thought he might actually say he’d prefer Disney. When I asked him to weigh the two, he never answered.

These days, I am inundated by my almost six year old’s commercials for Disney. She wants to be a princess for Halloween, selects Disney films for her afternoon TV time and sings along with the Disney CD’s in the car. I have begun to understand a bit of my father’s resistance to the magic kingdom. Ariel is anorexic, Pocahontas is a Native American Politically Correct Barbie doll, Belle is an intellectual snob who wants more than a provential life, meaning she wants to marry a rich guy. Meanwhile, Cinderella remains a helpless puppet of fate and Sleeping Beauty never gets to choose anything. Jasmine never gets to fly solo, and the only princess I ever really liked, Mulan, my kids don't watch.

I want my daughters to be strong independent and loving women when they mature, who choose spouses that encourage them to grow in creativity, intelligence and spiritual depth. I do not see these lessons in the many DVD’s that my daughter so loves. I read her stories of strong women and try to show other points of view, but the princesses in their sparkling dresses are siren like in their irresistibility to my six year olds’ bright blue eyes. She has begun asking in that sweet six year old voice, if we can go to Disneyland on vacation.

Now I am a soft touch, but even I can see the dollar signs floating away as she speaks dreamily of meeting Ariel and Mickey. We have a large family and the idea of managing my many offspring in that large amusement park causes instant migraines. I can summon any number of adult rational reasons to say “No.” but so far all I can muster is a weak-kneed “We’ll see.” I also know when I bring this up with her father, his response will be similar. The epic struggle between the very strong desire as a parent to somehow present all that is wondrous and fun and delightful to your children and at the same time not go bankrupt will erupt. Past experience would seem to indicate Disney has the edge.

Secretly I begin searching the internet for deals, maybe I will do a limited trip of a few, to squirrel away a few memories. Days are coming when I will have to worry about the CD’s and DVD’s far more than now, for the time when she becomes sixteen and sullen and wears clothes that will make me cringe far more than the dripping with pink sparkling confections she currently favors. I gulp hard at the idea of her maturing and suddenly feel far more benign about the Little Mermaid, Snow White and every other Disney Princess. Disney may not have God or vegetables, but it has a monopoly on my six year old’s imagination and heart and suddenly, that doesn’t seem so very bad.

I’ll supply the Church and carrots, and you know what I learned, “It’s a small world after all.”

P.S. My profound apologies if I’ve stuck that song in your head now as a result of reading this blog, just plug your ears and start singing the Star Spangled Banner until it goes away or you could try Humor-Blogs.com

Forty-one and Awaiting Maturation

At my age, I’m supposed to be educated, sophisticated and worldly wise.
There is a stack of books that educated people are supposed to have read, important things like the complete works of Dickens and Shakespeare, The Ancient Art of War, Das Kapital, the Federalist papers and Moby Dick. I am waiting for retirement to get to this list, when not reading them will be chucked up to old age and poor eyesight.

Adults are also supposed to like things like coffee and wine, sushi and blue cheese not accompanied by super hot Buffalo wings and beer. They can watch documentaries on war and read the serious sections of the paper with total recall. They wear jeans and sneakers for gardening and football games only, and they don’t voluntarily choose to dine at places that wrap the food in paper. As I understand it, some of them even listen to and love opera.

I am waiting for those chemical enzymes to kick in and transform me from a fairy tale loving, French fry noshing comic book reading plebian into a character out of a Henry James novel; who coifs her hair and wears dark form fitting frocks and speaks in mysteriously compelling short phrases that bewilder and bewitch those around her as she passes through the heathers without stepping into a gopher hole.

It’s not that I haven’t tried to mature. I dutifully checked out Bleak House from the library and read a play each summer from Shakespeare. I keep ordering wine at restaurants but I never finish a glass. I know how to talk about tannins and the deepening flavors and all that, but what I really think when I drink wine is, why didn’t I order a diet coke? I have eaten sushi with friends who love it and survived, but can’t figure out why no one doesn’t just say, “Hey this is a great piece of fish, just give it five minutes in a pan with garlic and olive oil.” I think they’re just trying to avoid doing the pots and pans in the kitchen.

My sister has bought me CD’s of opera, explaining which pieces were her favorites. She has also taken me to drink my first Starbucks, I got a violent headache after three sips. I had a similar reaction to the opera. My husband buys tickets to the symphony. We go. He shuts his eyes to listen. If I shut my eyes, I snore. My music tastes haven’t ever left the early 80’s and high school.

I have taught myself to read the editorial section before I hit up the funnies and the sports, but it’s rather like sitting through math class in High School before lunch. I do it, but only because I ought, and much of the front section just rolls past my brain which is fixated on what happened today in “For Better or Worse.”

So here I am at 41 and I still want big parties on my birthday with wrapped presents and a frosted cake with all the candles. I know the Saturday morning line up my kids watch, and I sneak my TV viewing under the responsible adult headline of “Parental Supervision.” I change the channel if I don’t like the cartoon or its animation. I read comic books inside of real books like “Seven Habits of Highly Successful People” and wear jeans or shorts 350 days out of the year. I don’t own a form fitting frock and I talk in breathless longwinded excited loud sentences. It’s not that I don’t like wine, opera and all things sophisticated; they just aren’t my first preference.

Given the fact that much of my life is lived like a stone that just perpetually skips on the water (never slowing or stopping to sink below the surface), introspection is not one of my strong suits. It requires a quieter mind and spirit than my temperament allows. Yesterday, my son was invited to take a course on manners and etiquette, designed to teach freshmen of high school how to act like the adults they will some day become. As I looked at the requirements that the boys wear jackets and ties, and the girls, dresses and gloves I wondered if one day my kids would grow out of their childhood tastes. I’d be left to go to McDonald’s, watch Disney movies and listen to Duran Duran on my own.

But then I remember, my husband prefers burgers to fois gras, and chocolate shakes to champagne. The other day, he came home with tickets for a baseball game and proposed a camping trip for the 4th of July weekend. After dinner, he asked for ice cream. So I stopped by the bookstore today, and even though, the complete works of Evelyn Waugh were on sale near the front of the store, I picked up the latest Fantastic Four comic for him, and tonight, we’re going to see Kung Fu Panda. Maturity can wait, at least until it feels fun and not like an assignment to eat my broccoli.

I will say though, some of that opera isn’t so bad. Thanks sis.

Reading Lessons

"Why should I read these when better versions are availble on DVD?" It was hard to beat the logical issues raised by one so young. Saying "The books are richer." didn't satisfy the way a good musical number with singing crabs could.

With my first child, I read to him every day from the time he was two. I was obsessive about it and sure enough, my diligence bore fruit. He entered Kindergarten already a solid reader. By second grade, he was handling the third Harry Potter book when it first came out without my help.

My subsequent daughter took a little bit longer, but dove into big books as soon as she got the hang of things. My third child, always striving to ensure I didn’t mistake her for her older sister, held out on falling in love with reading until third grade. Then she discovered…if you’re reading, Mom doesn’t make you clean…and it became a favorite and preferred activity.

Three kids past third grade, three solid readers…a good track record.

But numbers have begun to wear down my endurance for returning to Green Eggs and Ham and Curious George. I have allowed the later children to delve into questionable reading material like Captain Underpants –in part because my son would read with his older brother –and I didn’t have to look at it.

For my fiver, she delighted in such fare as "Tinker bell finds Her Place," a story so sugary I considered the possibility of injecting insulin after the fifth reading. Plus, reading aloud, both my son and daughter like interrupting and that drives me nuts. They are not into the reading world yet, not in the transported way my older three are. The words haven't yet successfully cast a spell over their brains.


When I introduced Charlotte’s Web, my son wanted to know when we’d get to the part where the gosling danced with the pig. In the Gingerbread Man, my kids asked where Donkey and Shrek were. My daughter was thoroughly put out by the unhappy ending of Hans Christian Anderson’s Little Mermaid, and they were completely outraged by the way some authors had the audacity to rework the stories of Winnie the Pooh, Stuart Little, and even Harry Potter. My son, being a visual learner saw books as being so old fashioned. "I'll just wait until the movie version.”


I wanted my son and daughter to take to reading with a bit more enthusiasm than they do vegetables, or my husband does leftovers.


Being a good mom, I summoned my inner Sebastian…(Sung to “Under the Sea”)

“Inside a book…
Inside a book…
The story is better
A real Page turner
Just Take a Look!
Those Words Create a bigger scene
Of a Place You’ve Never Been!
And in Full Color
If You Take the Trouble
To Just Read a Book..”

Maybe I’d have fared better if we hadn’t been in the library, or if I had a backup band of singing bass and clams.

However, he did grudgingly put back the movie book version of the Pirates of the Caribbean Part III and agree to check out “The Trumpeter Swan.” (the assigned book for the next book report). And she checked out the original Peter Pan. "Tinker Bell is in this one too!" she told me in a knowing half secret. "The librarian told me!"

I picked out "The Rough Faced Girl," an American Indian version of Cinderella and a younger version of "The Once and Future King."

Eyeing me with suspicion, my son glared at my selection. "I bet it doesn't have any pictures."
Some day they’ll thank me I’m sure.


In the meantime, I’m going to work on my Swan and Dance number.



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