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february 26, 2001."You can't smell your own shit on your knees!" I have a confession to make: I have never watched Survivor. Or Temptation Island or Big Brother or any of the other tawdry "stupid & beautiful people" shows. Why is this worthy of a confession? Because everybody else in the world is watching these shows, including otherwise intelligent people like Hermione & the Boy. They treat it like a dirty secret, but when they guiltily confess to one another they just boil over with commentary. It's like a secret Mason handshake and I'm not involved. It's no fun being virtuous. But I have been able to tolerate one trashy series lately. It's Canadian, so that's okay. It's called something like "Pop Star." Every week we watch a day in Girl Group Boot Camp as 25 contest winners fight to become part of the final 5 while sleazy judges and washed up choreographers pick them off one by one. The prize? Membership in the first Canadian Super Girl Group! Wheeee! I don't know why I keep watching this show. I can't stand the "industry professionals" who ooze insulting phoney corporate judgement at every opportunity. I don't like the idea of pop star boot camp and I don't like Girl Groups. But every Sunday I tune in, turn voyeur & drop dignity. It's not easy being lowbrow either.
Tonight I babysat kids for the first time in 2 ½ years. One of my group mates was looking totally stressed out in our afternoon meeting; it turned out that she had another meeting in the evening & no babysitter. Since I wasn't doing anything in particular tonight except cram for presentations, I impulsively offered my services. She was almost desperately grateful, which made me feel tremendously good about myself. We watched Scooby Doo & an hour and a half of Powerpuff Girls before the great bedtime battle began. The oldest girl is about 11 - not only can she cook simple things for herself, but she doesn't give anyone any trouble about anything. But the youngest is very emotional, very loud, and can go from zero to livid in 10 seconds. She didn't want to put on her pyjamas. She didn't want to go to bed. She didn't want to sleep in her room - I ended up chasing her all through the house before her sister & I cornered her. Then she went to bed. When I was a teenager, this would've severely traumatized me. I would've been angry at the little one and likely would've dragged her off to bed by main force. I don't know when things shifted inside me, but suddenly I'm a person who can remain calm in the storm of childish passion. Maybe it was practicum that changed me. Maybe it was the grab bag of tricks we're taught in every class. But somehow it was easy to find the right thing to do: I spoke calmly to her until she would come, then I carried her back to bed. It was really quite amazing. See, I've always liked kids, but I've never known how to act around them. I never know when I should be firm & when I should let it go. Or at least, I've always been like that before. Now there's a new place in me that speaks to children in a language that may not be their own, but is close enough to conduct business in.
Under the banner of research, I performed two internet searches tonight, one for marching bands (I'm not kidding) and one for John Coltrane. But when I typed "coltrane pictures" into Google, the sixth hit took me to Robbie Coltrane pictures. Specifically, Robbie Coltrane dressed as Rubeus Hagrid. All roads dooo lead to Harry Potter... |
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