Day in the Life: September 2007 Archives

I've often remarked that The Boy received exactly NO physical characteristics from me--he is a teeny carbon copy of Hublet, which does afford me much amusement when I observe them standing side-by-side--but I take solace in the fact that his personality is much closer to mine than to Hublet's.

Well, I'll take solace in it until he hits adolescence, at which point I will deny that he has any personality traits even remotely resembling my own. 

So, as I've enjoyed The Boy's evolution into Boyhood, I've been waiting to see if he would ever share one trait that I hold dear to my heart (well, behind a love of roller coasters, which - CHECK!  Woo-hoo! Can't wait until the State Fair!):  a love of horror.

Hublet does not share this trait, and my annual Halloween Evil Dead Trilogy movie fests just aren't as much fun solo.

This past weekend, we were perusing the Cartoon Network and happened upon an ad for their Goosebumps Halloween Movie, weirdly titled, "The Witching Hour: Don't Think About it."  The Boy stared at the ad in fascination and then turned to me and said, "Oooh!  That's a SCARY Movie!"

My heart sank.  Until later that day, when The Boy asked, "Mommy, can we see that scary movie?"

I told him we'd TiVo it on Sunday, since it was 2 hours, and he could watch one hour Sunday, and one Monday.

And thus began The Great Scary Movie Experiment, wherein we would determine whether or not The Boy was indeed capable of handling a Goosebumps made-for-tv flick starring one of the Osment spawn as a disaffected goth chick.

Since the only nightmares The Boy's ever had have consisted of being attacked by giant blue bumblebees, I decided to remain hopeful.

We did have to snuggle with him during the scary parts, but he has now seen the whole thing, and it made him more excited than scared.  We did a total recap during bedtime last night, with The Boy acting out all the scary parts.  And as a bonus for me, it was fun to see a non-jaded horror movie viewer actually be SURPRISED at the "surprise twist" ending of a movie.

So, no nightmares.  No requests for additional lighting, checks under the bed or in the closet, or any of that stuff. And this morning, The Boy inquired about when the next scary movie was coming on.

Cartoon Network has scheduled the old Goosebumps series to run during October, so it looks like we'll be TiVo-ing those as well.

I've created a monster.

Yay!

Because I know you care - care! - about the series of themed chapeaus worn by our Crazy Hat Wearin' Drama Teacher, I'm sure you'll be pleased to know that this week she has taken it up a notch - yesterday she was fairly demure with a green dragon perched atop her pate, but today she went whole hog, or whole eagle, or whatever.

She had a blue eagle full face covering on.

And dropoff took an additional 5 minutes, probably because she couldn't see out of the eyeholes.

Sigh.

Ah, fall ball season.  I get to sit outside in the cooling autumn air and watch The Boy and others in his cohort spin around until they're dizzy, pick flowers, fall over - a lot - throw dirt, and play tag.

And that's when they're on the field.  The dugout is an entirely different matter.

But because I believe that fall ball really should be experienced to be believed, I have here attempted to give you a bit of the flavor of one of the games by recording snatches of the commenary heard during a t-ball game.

"Stop throwing dirt.  No, NOW!  There will be no dirt throwing!"

"Michael, the ball!  Yes, that ball!  Get it!"

"Jake, put down the bat and sit on the bench."

"Has anyone seen Christian's helmet?"

"Hayley!  Honey, you can't play shortstop lying down!  Will you stand up?  Okay, will you at least squat?"

"No. Dirt. Throwing!"

"Michael!  The Ball!  Yes, AGAIN!"

"Jake!  Son, swing that bat like you'd swing it at your sister!"  [sotto voce] "Well, if he would do it that way he'd get a home run every time!"

"Christian, what color is the helmet?  Blue?  Oh, that helps."

"Ethan!  Tag the runner!  The runner!  THE RUNNER!  You don't have to race him to second!"

"MICHAEL! THE BALL, SON!"

"Throw it to first!"

"Throw it to first!"

"Throw it to first!"

"Nevermind, sweetie.  The runner's on third now. Just hand it to the pitcher."

"Hayley?  Why are you sitting in the bleachers?  You're supposed to be in center field."

"Kids, stop wedging yourselves between the chain link fence and the dugout.  You'll get stuck."

"Here, Christian.  Just use this helmet.  Your mommy can help you find yours later."

"MICHAEL!  BALL!"

"Where's Christian's bat?"

"What did I tell you?  Didn't I say, 'don't throw dirt, you'll get it in your eyes?'  And what did you do?  And what happened?  Here, let me wash your eyes out."

"Christian, is this your helmet?  Where's your hat?"

"MICHAEL!  LOOK OUT!"

"Good job, guys!  See you next week!"

Man, I love T-ball.

Or, "why I skipped church this Sunday and had zero guilt."  Guilt is more Hublet's style, anyway.

I skipped because:

a) Apparently my body really, REALLY needed rest, since the combined efforts of both Hublet and The Boy were insufficient to rouse me before NOON.  I haven't slept past 9:30 a.m. since before The Boy was born. It. Was. FABULOUS.

and

b) We're studying Oprah.  In church.  Well, to be more specific we're studying Oprah in Sunday School, but coming as it does hot on the heels of a couple of weeks of soul-searching about what Starbucks can teach Christians about - what?  Better marketing? - my patience with this sort of thing is wearing thin, and I'm tired of sitting in class thinking snarky thoughts and trying very hard not to rain on the pop culture parade. So I will vent here instead.

Let me be clear. I can see why people would say, "Ooh, that's interesting!" when an author goes out of his or her way to demonstrate how you can find tenets of christianity among secular pop culture, but on the other hand, why is this news? If you're a practicing Christian, you tend to find the themes of redemption, salvation, grace and community everywhere, not just on television from 4 to 5 p.m. or while ensconced in a puffy velvet sofa and using the free wi-fi. Is pointing out the obvious really teaching us anything new?

And I can never escape the strange, underlying vibe of desperation in these efforts.  That somehow, we need to prove that religion is "relevant" to people, and that further, the best way to do it isn't by relying on teachings that have held up for thousands of years, but by emulating examples of 21st century consumer culture that, despite their popularity, are most often featured as punchlines to the "what's wrong with America?" joke.

It's almost as if we have to prove that it's okay to like vapid, throwaway crap by demonstrating that "there's plenty of God stuff in there, too!" Or the reverse, that it's okay to like God, because, see - it's cool and stuff! Just like Starbucks!

I don't think God is gonna hold that latte or being riveted by Oprah's latest book club selection against you, folks.  I like plenty of vapid, throwaway crap, too, and if I want a Grande Mocha, my butt's in the Starbucks line along with everyone else's. I'm not saying I'm somehow above pop culture, or that I'm some sort of lofty theologian - just that I don't see why I need to use Oprah to justify my religion, or why I should use my religion to justify my mocha.