God, Satan and Reality TV

I saw today that they are airing yet another Reality TV show called Nail Files. OMG, a Reality TV show about finger nails? Maybe I’m missing a gene, but how many of these do we need? Want to see? Here’s a list:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_reality_television_programs

Now I admit to watching America’s Next Top Model. Religiously. And I’m completely and totally ashamed. But I have convinced myself that I’m studying character development for my books. Every cycle has a sociopath. I think they really have to work at it to find  just the right one. Of course, the sociopath never wins, but the show keeps them on long enough to really mess with everyone’s head.

In fact, the upcoming cycle 17 of ANTM will have an “allstar” season; and they have selected models (that didn’t win) from the past 16 cycles. At least HALF of those selected were the sociopaths. It will be an interesting cycle for sure.

‘Cause ultimately audiences want a story filled with good and evil. Since the dawn of time, we have sat around the fire telling stories. Everyone wants something that catches and holds their attention. To do that, it must have a plot of some sort, even if a small one.

News is all about plot. A press release has to be something that can be turned into a story, because reporters are looking for that, a story.

Novelists have to write a story. If nothing bad happens, nobody is interested. And the more extreme the story, the better. Go Brittany Spears!

Even photographers need to have a “narrative” in their photos nowadays. (I learned that from America’s Next Top Model. See what an informative show it is?)

What is the drive for story? Why does something bad have to happen to make us interested?

Much of the Christian faith believes that a time will come when we ascend to heaven. “The lion will lay down with the lamb.” But I have never understood that. There will be no bad guys, only good guys. There will be no story. And let’s face it, after 20 minutes or so of sitting at the feet of Jesus, adoring him, people will be bored out of their mind. Shit will happen.

Now most folks will tell you that God made everything. So logic would dictate that he had to have made Satan, too. Right? Supposedly it was to give us free will so that we could “choose” goodness over bad. That may be.

But honestly? I think God was bored. God had a little fire going in the center of the universe, but everything back then was just good; there were no mean girls, no bullies, no serial killers. No villains = No story.

So what did he do? God cooked up some popcorn and then created Satan, to mix up the plot a bit. There was that first sociopath who could add some spice to the upcoming cycle of life, mess with people’s heads, and generally keep the flow of the show interesting.

Blasphemy? Naw. God just loves loves Reality TV, same as us.

But what will He think of the Nail Files?

A Fatherless Father’s Day

My parents divorced when I was 2, just after my brother was born and then died shortly thereafter. They married at 18 and my father went into the Marines to play clarinet. Apparently he was quite good. But their marriage wasn’t made to last. Neither knew what they were doing and the pains of poverty and then the death of a child was too much for either. My father disappeared inside himself and my mother ran away.

I was raised by my mother, and I would never exchange her for any other mother on the planet. She was, and still is, my closest friend. I was lucky there.

Not so with my father. I met him once when I was 11. My mother finally tracked him down to have him pay some toward child support. In an effort to be fatherly, I was flown to Michigan to meet him, his new wife, and their son–my half brother. I remember we played board games, which was fun, but beyond that I was overwhelmed with homesickness. I didn’t know this man and he didn’t really know what to do with me.

That was the last time I saw him. He did dutifully pay child support until I was 18. And my 18th birthday held no check, and no birthday card. I had been a task that he honored, but he was done.

I was angry and frustrated. We don’t have much perspective at 18. But I decided then and there that I would have no children. I didn’t want to put anything else through what I had gone through as a kid–my mom in and out of marriages, being poor and traveling from one school to the next, having an abusive step-father, being abandoned by one step-father who actually acted like a father to me–for a few years.

Fathers were as unpredictable as Star-Bellied Sneetches.

Off again! On again! In again! Out again! 
Through the machines they raced round and about again, 
Changing their stars every minute or two. They kept paying money. 
They kept running through until the Plain nor the Star-Bellies knew 
Whether this one was that one or that one was this one. Or which one 
Was what one or what one was who. 

The best option was just to ensure no one ever had to be a father in my life. That no child of mine would ever feel abandoned or abused.

I don’t hate men. In fact, I have met a lifetime of wonderful ones. My mom once said, “All men are scum.” But I never found that to be true. I was married for 20 years to one of my best friends. And I’m married now to another wonderful man.

And he is a father. In fact, I think he is first and foremost a father. Before being a husband. Before being a musician. Before being a brother, or son.

He has two boys. One 12 and one 15. He lives for his boys. His own father died when he was 19. He says that his father was an illusive figure in his life. As the youngest of four children, he was in the background and didn’t feel the direct sun of his father very often. He wishes he had.

So perhaps his own childhood created the commitment to be there for his kids in every way.

My own father has two boys, too. They are married with children of their own. I can see by their Facebook pages that he has been a good father to them. Both of my half-brothers have “friended” me on Facebook as has my father’s wife of many, many years.

But even so, my father still does not write me. I told the oldest brother to say “Hi” to his father for me. He didn’t seem to notice my choice of possessive. His father was also my father, but then, I guess he really isn’t.

I guess those of us without fathers never let go of those feelings that out there, somewhere, is the father we wish we’d have. Perhaps it is just a myth. My mother loved me with all her heart. That should be enough.

My husband told me this morning. “I did not get to know my father as a person, as an adult, because he died too soon for that to happen, although you’d think by 19 I might have known him better but it was not the case.  From all accounts, he was not someone easy to know.  He was a good man though I believe.  I still wish I had a chance to have some kind of grown up relationship with him. He would have loved my beer.”

I have to think that my father would have loved me. At least that is what I tell myself.

A Dream within a Dream

Last night I dreamed about my husband, John, and his younger boy, Liam. I think the older boy, Aidan, was there for a second, but then disappeared.

I was living in an apartment somewhere (a crappy place if I recall correctly) and Liam ran ahead of John and snuck up on me when I was sleeping. We gave each other a big hug when I was awake enough. Then John came in. But he was different somehow. As though he had become the powerful man I see inside him. Sometimes he channels stubbornness instead of strength, but last night, in the dream, he was so strong in spirit, the way I know he can be and love so much.

But then I woke up in the dream, although I realized I was still dreaming. John and I both realized we had been dreaming within the dream. We laughed and wondered at it. In that level of the dream, John wasn’t as strong, but he was trying hard to be so. But it was as though the wind was pushing hard against his spirit, keeping him from moving very fast.

I think that is when I glimpsed Aidan, but it was only for a heartbeat.

Alice and Malice

I had an interesting dream last night.

I was in the midst of a battle of wizards. There were clearly “good” wizards and “bad” wizards. The bad wizards were dressed in colorful garb (emerald greens and ruby reds) and they were getting the better of the good wizards (all dressed in white). The good wizards seemed unable to respond to the bad wizard attacks and were, therefore, losing.

The main white wizard was Alice and the main red wizard was Malice. Alice in Wonderland?

I identified with the white wizards, but realized that the power really came from the “bad” wizards. They were channeling true power within themselves, it was only what they DID with the power that was bad. The white wizards wouldn’t even channel the power within themselves because they saw how the bad wizards used it. Long story short (too late, I know), I realized that the key was to be able to channel the power, but not to hurt people–that you had to combine both mindsets to be a whole and powerful wizard, neither good nor bad.

It was odd, because in the new X-Men movie, there was a similar theme.  The key to power lay between “rage and serenity.” Hmmm. I think there is a key in this for me.

Are we white wizards powerless and under attack? Not channeling any power or magic?But yet we are angry at those bad wizards out being greedy and war mongering. And being quite successful at it.

I try to be such a “good” and “moral” person that I forget that a little self-righteous, self-protecting power has never hurt anyone. In fact is essential in life. So I laid awake for a long time last night contemplating that.

Popcorn Perk

I am getting older. I am no longer in that place where I have a lifetime ahead of me. But it has its perks. I guess.

I got to use my AARP card for the first time yesterday at the movie theater. I went to watch the new X-Men movie. It was $12 to see the movie. $14 to PARK to see the movie. When I went to get popcorn, a medium pop was $5.50 and a medium popcorn was $7.00. OMFG!

But then I saw an ad whiz by on the animated menu board overhead (which, BTW, had no pricing). I caught a glimpse of an AARP card discount. It went by too fast to see exactly what I would be getting or for how much, but $12.50 for pop and popcorn was downright criminal.

I hadn’t yet used my AARP card. There is something very final and undeniable about using that “old person’s” discount card. They send you the offer at 50. So it has been two years that I have had it without even taking it out of my wallet. But again, $12.50 for pop and popcorn.

It wasn’t busy in the theater. It was an afternoon showing on a weekday, so I said, ‘what the heck.’

I asked the rather overweight, 18ish counter girl about the AARP special as I handed her my card. I had said the words. I had shown the card. I felt old.

She looked perplexed, ran the card through her credit card machine and low and behold, I could get a small popcorn and pop for only $5.50! And the smalls were big enough. I said, “OK!”

It works at Regal Movie Theatres. http://www.regmovies.com/theatrelocations/

But even with my discount, watching a movie ended up costing me $31 (I’m not old enough to get the senior discount on the ticket price.)

How weird it is when you realize that going to watch a movie has become a major expense.

Why do we have to lie?

The world seems to be filled with a dearth of moral civility. Greed and lies are more often the way of it out there.

I was looking up the guy who I replaced at my last job. He had been fired and I wondered where he landed in this economy. He blew through a couple million of the company’s money trying to launch a product. The product launch resulted in less than $1,000 in revenue revenue. I kid you not.

I found him. A VP at another company. Yet, when you read his online profile, he makes it sound like he walked on water and divided the seas at the company. He takes credit for work other people did and tells no tales of his own disastrous performance. WTF?

In marketing, I am supposed to promote myself as the “one who personally changed the world at a business.” Yet I don’t believe such a thing is possible, and I’d be lying to say so, even though I feel I have been a great complement to many businesses. But it takes a team to build a business and I believe to take credit for it personally is the most offensive deceit.

And yet that seems to be what it takes to get ahead. Business are running scared, with good reason, but they seem to have jettisoned reason and wisdom alongside with generosity of spirit.

Buy, buy, buy. Click on my ad!

If you do a search on “how to get people to click on my ad” you get 238 million results.

If you do a search for “how to stop world hunger” you get 4 million results.

So what is a girl to do? How do we change what our society values?