fatherhood

The Second Third, Week 24: Less TV Is Good TV

/ J. Thorp / 2 Comments

Fraggarackincarklefargis…

Remember when your parents told you TV would rot your brain? I think perhaps the most compelling evidence of the truth of this statement is what passes for TV today. Those who are passionate enough about television to choose to make it their career were likely exposed to it as children, and the fact that their brains were affected negatively is evidenced by what they produce.

For example: until I rented a Looney Tunes DVD, my kids didn’t know TV cartoons were meant to be laugh-out-loud funny. Everything they had seen up to that point either A) taught them Important Life Lessons and Thinking Skills, B) counteracted A with brainless humor and bodily functions, or C) was primarily meant to sell collectible cards and toys. Bugs Bunny, Yosemite Sam, Daffy Duck, and the Roadrunner were comic revelations (not to mention the music)! They laughed until they fell from the futon, laughed until tears fell from their eyes, laughed until they hurt and begged between great gasping breaths for more.*

Then we sent the DVD back, and they returned to Blue’s Clues, Dragon Tales, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and Sponge-Bob.

Earlier in our marriage, Jodi and I watched a handful of shows regularly. Most were sitcoms: Seinfeld and Friends, the short-lived Sports Night, Mad About You, Everybody Loves Raymond. We were hooked on Alias for a few years, and I used to love This Week (with Sam Donaldson, Cokie Roberts, and George Will) each Sunday morning, just to get the juices flowing.

I remember the Seinfeld finale: how the joke was on us; how it drove home that we had spent countless hours over the past countless years watching four awful people behaving like selfish children and hurting those around them. The friends on Friends were also whiny and self-centered, and Raymond made a career out of the miseries of married life. Don’t get me wrong: I laughed at these shows — but sometimes afterward I wondered why.

Today my bride and I watch two sitcoms: The Office and Community. We used to watch 30 Rock, but found the humor less and less to our liking. Community is now in the same tailspin for me. It’s still funny at times, but some of the jokes are beginning to clog my filters. Like 30 Rock this year, next year I suspect I won’t miss missing it. The Office edges into that territory from time to time, then redeems itself…we may stick with that one.

So this spring we found another show. They hooked our whole family with a free burrito at Chipotle. (Good bait.) We watched America’s Next Great Restaurant on NBC, a reality show in which people with ideas for a restaurant competed for the chance to partner with four chef/restauranteur/investors to open a new chain of restaurants in NYC, LA, and (yes!) Minneapolis. Aside from about 43-too-many jokes about the Joey’s original name for his meatball shop (Saucy Balls, which ultimately became Brooklyn Meatball Company after the 43-too-many jokes), the show was clean, the food was good, the winner had a great story: his father rescued him from a bad spot with his mother when he was little, and the soul food recipes that helped him win were his Dad’s. The winner was the favorite of all of us except Trevor (he was Trevor’s second pick); a great cheer went up in the Thorp house when he won; and Emma has asked that her belated birthday dinner be at the new Soul Daddy in Mall of America.

And now it’s over. We enjoy a few other shows that we watch online or on demand — History Channel’s American Pickers and Top Shot and Travel Channel’s Man v. Food, in particular. They are fun, interesting, educational…but they insist (in the case of Pickers and MvF) to edge toward adult humor at least once an episode, or (in the case of Top Shot), machismo and obscenities (bleeped and unbleeped). I used to watch Nature on PBS as a kid, which was narrated with a sense of wonder and mystery; the recent LIFE series on Discovery Channel (with Oprah narrating) seemed to relish describing the mating habits of the creatures they filmed as though both the subjects and audience were lusty teenagers.

I want a TV show in which I never have to say, “Okay, gang — what that guy just said? Never say that.” Or, “Yeah, you don’t need to worry about what she meant just yet.” Or, “Sorry, Trevvy, if he was your favorite character; nice people don’t act like that.”

Yeah, I know. I’m getting older, and older-fashioned. The good news is, in my Second Third, we watch way less TV than we used to. And I don’t miss it.

Now get off my lawn.

The Second Third, Week 22: Stay-At-Home Dad, Part 2

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Last week’s Second Third post (posted just yesterday) touted the family-related advantages a new job that will enable me to telecommute. As the count currently stands, this new opportunity will give me a flexible schedule in which to complete some of my own writing, and will substantially cut down on time stuck in traffic and away from home so I can do more of the fun fatherly things I ought to do with my brood.

In this post (Part 2 of yesterday’s), I turn from my brood to my bride.

I’m not the perfect husband and father. (I know: shocker!) I generally think I’m right, I’m overly emotional, I change plans only with reluctance, and I like to be in charge. I can be diplomatic (with effort), but can also have a short fuse. And as I’ve said before, I’m also a bit of a navel-gazer — I know these things about myself because I spend a lot of time snooping around the corners of my mind. But I’ve been a bit near-sighted for a long time now, so I see things through my own lenses, and assume that others see and react to situations the same way I do. And I’ve never been quick, so when I make a cosmic leap — such as If I were in that situation, I’d be irritated, therefore, she said that because she’s irritated! — I usually realize 30 seconds too late that I’ve reacted wrongly, or at least prematurely.

Unfortunately, my current job demands extraordinary levels of restraint, consultation, and patience. Everyone has an opinion, and at a university, multiple opinions are given more or less equal weight and consideration. This can be a great strength, but it also exhausts the mind and saps the soul. I’ve trained myself to jump through hoops during my work day, with mane neatly combed and a domesticated grin. As a result, I come home with much roaring and gnashing of teeth. The best of me is spent on my colleagues and the issues of the day, and my bride gets the leftovers. Not pretty.

It’s not right that my very best friend takes the brunt of all my worst characteristics. It is a strangely beautiful thing that I feel comfortable enough, confident enough, loved enough to let down my guard and turn off my filters around her. But I should love her better than that.

So here’s the theory: if my work is at home, and my circle of colleagues is reduced, I will spend less on others and have more…tact? discretion? charity! to spend on Jodi. In my Second Third, God willing, I’ll treat at least as well as my co-workers…and hopefully even better.

The Second Third, Week 21: Stay-At-Home Dad, Part 1

/ J. Thorp / 1 Comment

First off, let me say that initially I committed to a Second Third post every Wednesday for a year. The “every Wednesday” part came unhitched when I remembered that I had also committed to teaching confirmation classes almost every Wednesday. For awhile, I started adding (Belated) to the titles when I posted after Wednesday. Now I’ll just be satisfied to hit 52 Second Third posts sometime around the second week of November.

Long story short: this is last week’s post.

Our dear friends Todd and Suzette and their kids were here last week. The weather was lovely, so we went to the park and even improvised soccer and kickball games in our too-small front yard. I tracked a high fly ball with such laser-like intensity and speed that I collided with the neighbor’s basketball pole, which rang like a bell, but left no mark. Classic Jim. I ran, jumped around, got myself winded and sweaty and sore. The kids are still talking about it. Everyone had a blast, and it was easy. It just requires me to be home a little more during the daylight hours.

So I mentioned in an earlier, different Second Third post that I was making a transition to a new position that would allow me a great deal more flexibility to write (and finish!) a book of my own. My new position also enables me to work from home more regularly, which means less time on the road. We’ll spend less on fuel and parking, and I’ll be home for Trevor’s baseball games, Emma’s soccer games, fishing, canoeing, gardening, swimming. I lose 10 to 15 hours a week in traffic; meanwhile, Gabe bought a knife with his birthday money, and it occurred to me that neither he nor Brendan have ever really whittled or scaled a bluegill. And Jodi and I have so little time alone together that a 20-minute lunch conversation over PB&J is a tremendous blessing. I need to be home more, and not just to finish a book!

In my Second Third, I have been blessed with the opportunity to work from home more often, and I don’t intend to squander this gift. Indeed, at this point I’m counting down the weeks.

The Second Third, Week 20: Good Shootin’

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Blogger’s Note: Sorry about the ad in the clip above; I couldn’t find an ad-free clip online.

Emma Rose turned nine today. Nine years old already, and I have friends and family whose tween and teen daughters are noticing — and worse, being noticed by — boys. I was thinking about this past year, and Emma getting her ears pierced on her own dime, and cutting her hair to donate to Locks of Love. She’s growing up faster than I’d like.

I was thinking about what a beautiful, bright young girl she is — what a tremendous blessing she is to us, and how none of the boys in the area better get any ideas — and a variation on the old “cleaning the guns” scare tactic occurred to me. I’d like to invite the young man to the range with me — my treat — just to get to know him better. And in my Second Third, I hope to master both the shooting tricks shown in the clip above from A Fistful of Dollars. I have the weapons for the job.

Bet I wouldn’t have to say a word…

Dostoevsky, or Three Things to Love About The Brothers Karamazov

/ J. Thorp / 2 Comments

Blogger’s Note: Three long summers (and three even longer winters) ago, I agreed to my friend Jacqui’s challenge to read 15 Classics in 15 Weeks. I have since read 10 of 15, this being my tenth from the list. The last one, Homer’s The Odyssey took 11 months, not because it was overly long or monotonous, but because it required a level of mental engagement I couldn’t always give it. The same is true for this one, which has taken me more than a year…

I literally just finished The Brothers Karamazov and logged into this blog with a tear in my eye. It has not managed to displace Steinbeck’s East of Eden as perhaps my favorite book ever (thus far) — but I imagine it will prove to be a 936-page seed that will germinate, slowly grow, and bear fruit years from now. It will stick with me, I have no doubt. Without further ado, Three Things to Love about The Brothers Karamazov:

  • Absurd As Us. Many, and perhaps most, of the characters seem absurd, even over-the-top. Chances are you’ve never been in a town such as this, with people such as these. You know no one like the Karamazov clan or their diverse friends and lovers — and yet, each rings true, and we recognize ourselves, our friends, and our families in the peculiarities we find here.
  • Fatherhood and Brotherhood. What does it mean to be a father? A brother? A friend? What would you endure for fools who share your surname, whom you can abuse but no one else can touch — what loyalties do we bear to our fathers, sons, and brothers? Though you might guess that this is a theme from the title, these ideas emerge slowly and subtly from the plot, since the Karamazov men’s family ties are, uh, looser than most…
  • Religion and Culture. Dostoevsky does not shy away from religion and philosophy, permitting his characters to speak at length (and in character, so not always clearly) about the existence of God, morality, humanity, science, psychology, justice, the state, and more. I was struck by how a book written circa 1880 could have so much to say about our world in 2011.

You might ask, would I recommend it? I might reply: in general, or to you, specifically? I don’t know how to answer, so for now, I will say that I enjoyed it very much, and that it rewards persistence. It is a great book.

I have another, contemporary novel to knock out before I proceed, but it should be a quicker read. Next on this long-running (and long-overdue) challenge will be a book not on my original list of 15, but one recommended by my good friend Fr. Tyler at Prairie Father: Brideshead Revisited. Fr. Tyler, incidentally, recently wrote this wonderful review of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment.