Picket Fence Post

For this week’s Friday Funnies installment, I’m going to recommend that you tune into a new ABC Wednesday night comedy with which I’ve recently become enamored: The Middle, starring Patricia Heaton from Everybody Loves Raymond. The show heavily reminds me of the off-beat comedy from Malcolm in the Middle which is now, sadly, only airing in reruns.

Heaton’s Frankie Heck is a hard working, extremely harried car saleswoman who has three oddball kids and a quarry manager husband who often acts like her fourth kid. She’s also recently learned that she has to also help out elderly relatives who can no longer drive, oh, and her family’s always strapped for cash. So, it stands to reason that Frankie’s major league stressed out.

In the clip below (from this week’s episode), Frankie decides to take a 15-minute break at the car dealership while her colleague promises to cover for her, although disaster ensues when she emerges from her “break” in the dingy women’s bathroom. This scene reminded me of the days when my kids were babies and toddlers and just being able to spend an hour at CVS all by myself seemed like a luxurious break.

You can watch full episodes of The Middle for free on its web site.

Item #1: Lessons from the 1960s

Okay, I’ll admit it. I am obsessed with Mad Men. (I think some of my friends secretly cannot WAIT for the short Mad Men season to conclude so I’ll stop dropping Don and Betty Draper’s names into virtually every conversation, blog post and Tweet.)

Annnywaayy . . . this week, over on Mommy Tracked (note the new spelling of the site’s name), I wrote a column about how watching the show, set in the 1960s, has given me a new-found understanding of how women in my family were raised and the expectations which were instilled in them when they were grown women, some expectations which they never jettisoned, even long after the feminist movement went mainstream.

Watching Mad Men’s affluent, Grace Kelly look-alike at-home mom Betty Draper, newly married career gal Joan Holloway (who thinks she wants what Betty has, not realizing that Betty hates her life) and the single, aspiring careerist Peggy Olson interact with the 1960s world has consistently brought to my mind aunts, grandmothers and sometimes my mother and has helped me look at their viewpoints with a whole heck of a lot less judgement than I used to.

Item #2: Family Dinners

Also on Mommy Tracked this week is a piece by Abby Margolis Newman, a mother of five (including two teens and one tween), who challenged the notion advanced in a New York Times article (and elsewhere) that families who are interested in keeping their kids off drugs, unpregnant, engaged in school and not off toting a rifle under a trench coat someplace should strive to have family meals together at least five times a week.

She wrote: “. . . [The] National Center on Addition and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASA) also shows that ‘teenagers who eat with their families less than three times a week times a week are more likely to turn to alcohol, tobacco and drugs than those who dine with their families five times a week.’”

Given her family’s hyper-busy schedule and that her husband doesn’t get home until after 7:30 p.m., Margolis Newman said that even eating together three times a week is a stretch:

“The boys are at three different schools and are involved in sports and theatrical productions. This situation, needless to say, is not conducive to cozy family dinners during the week. Frankly, we’re lucky if we even get one sit-down dinner per week — and I mean at the table . . .

So, if my teenage and pre-teen boys get only one family dinner per week, does this mean they are five times as likely to turn to alcohol, tobacco and drugs? Holy crap. And do the chances of this bad behavior go up even higher if I, as the stay-at-home parent, do not actually do any home cooking but rather buy the pre-marinated chicken breasts, the frozen (but organic!) oven fries, and never vary our vegetable choices? Does eating In n’ Out burgers in the car on the way to or from baseball practice — as long as the boys are all together — count as a family meal (is there such a thing as partial credit)?”

Does your family eat dinner together at least five times a week?

Item #3: Reality Check Survey (Please Chime in Below in Comments Section!)

Statements directed at me by my children since school began:

“Everyone else on my soccer team has a cell phone but me.”

“My friend Matt can watch as much TV as he wants . . . No, his mother doesn’t stop him . . . No! Really! She doesn’t!”

“I’m the ONLY one in my class whose mom makes him pick up after the dog.”

I’ve been told all manner of tall tales by the kids — specifically my fifth graders — about what other kids’ parents are or are not allowing their children to do. Not that what other parents do or don’t do is going to change my opinion that my rugrats do not need cell phones at this time. And no matter what other parents report, I’m not putting a TV or a computer in their bedrooms any time soon. (To do so would result in my children watching TV until their eyes bleed.) And if they’re going to use the internet, it’s going to be in a public area (our kitchen, family room, etc.) so I can walk by to glance at what they’re doing. (I’ve already been asked, “If you type in ‘naked butts dot com’ into the internet what will you get?”) 

With all the smack that goes on in their school hallways (talk which prompted one of my kids to ask me to define “pole dancer” because this child heard kids joking about the subject in the hall), I wanted to do my own investigating and find out what other folks really are or aren’t doing with regard to cell phones, TVs, computers and family dog care.

Here’s where you, my smart readers come in. I would love to hear your answers to the following five questions:

1. How old is your kid(s)?

2. Does your kid(s) have a cell phone? If so, at what age did the kid(s) get it?

3. Does your kid(s) have unlimited TV watching time?

4. Unlimited computer and video game time?

5. If you have a family dog, is your kid(s) ever expected to clean up after the dog?

Please feel free to post your answers to my Reality Check Survey in the comments section below, or, if you’d prefer, e-mail me at: meredithobrien@hotmail.com.

Looking forward to reading your answers.

Image credit: AMC.

If you ever get to feeling down about how you’re doing in parenting your kid (or kids) do yourself a favor and spend a moment watching Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ sitcom, The New Adventures of Old Christine for a reality check.

Take last week’s episode, “Honey I Ran Over The Kid,” Christine Campbell (Louis-Dreyfus) was in a heated debate with her ex-husband Richard over who was the safer (and saner) parent. In the video below, Christine was incensed when Richard brought Ritchie home with a minor, post-skateboarding injury after she’d secured so much safety gear onto the boy that he put Randy in the giant red snowsuit from the Christmas Story movie to shame. This scene occurred BEFORE, Christine accidentally ran her son down with her car (she was following him “for safety” when he was riding a bike to a friend’s house). This kicked off a warped competition for “worst parent” where Christine and Richard kept trying to one-up the other with sordid tales of each other’s poor parenting.

When I’m done watching this show, I always feel as though I’m not doing such a bad job after all. At least I’m not Christine Campbell.

Who doesn’t love House, the Fox medical drama built around the cantankerous and rogue Dr. Gregory House (Hugh Laurie), who irritates everyone around him while he and his crack team of physicians solve medical mysteries?

For the past few weeks, House has featured a storyline about the hospital’s chief administrator, Dr. Lisa Cuddy (Lisa Edelstein), who became a foster mother to an infant whom she hopes to adopt. After years of failed infertility treatments, Cuddy finally got to take home a baby. But once the baby came home, things weren’t quite as warm and maternal as Cuddy, a single mom, had imagined they would be.

I wrote about the Cuddy-working mom/new mom story arc in my Pop Culture & Politics column this week, in which I mentioned probably one of the best working mom exchanges I’ve heard on a TV program in a while:

Cuddy had just passed her department of children’s services inspection as a competent foster mother, yet remained irritated that she’d done so when her home was a mess and she was generally disorganized. Her colleague, Dr. James Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard) urged her to focus on passing the inspection and forget about the mess, but she wouldn’t.

“Why do women always do that . . . create ridiculous standards that no human could meet, with your careers, with your kids?” Wilson asked. “You’ve got to be more like us men.”

“Be lazy?” she replied sarcastically. “Blame others?”

“Get help! Most men in your position have a deputy and two assistants at work, and a wife and two nannies at home. You’re not Superwoman. Don’t be martyr!”

Image credit: Fox/Adam Taylor via the blog House is Right.

Worried that the railing-thin young female stars of the newly revamped 90210 are sending the wrong message to impressionable girls, Entertainment Weekly ran a piece quoting unnamed sources who said folks are growing concerned about the actresses’ bodies which were called ”alarmingly thin, with arms that seem thickest at the wrist, and legs that look like, well arms.” The AMC show Mad Men (shout out to the Emmy winner for best drama!) was singled out for promoting a “healthy body image” mostly because of actress Christina Hendricks, who plays a sultry office manager on the program and who EW called “the very definition of sexy.”

While watching the Emmys last night, I was absolutely taken with how Hendricks made actual, feminine curves fashionable. Take a look at the photo of Hendricks in her green dress at last night’s awards show. Amidst the sea of toothpicks, she stood out and, to echo EW, provided a much healthier attitude toward the female form than the anorexic celebs who usually populate red carpets.

So if you have a daughter who starts to covet the figures of one of the new 90210 gals, show her a photo of Hendricks (maybe not this one of the gown with the plunging neckline, but a tasteful one from the show, like this one) and tell her there are other ways to be beautiful.

Better yet, visit the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty web site, be sure to check out the section for moms who are looking to help their daughters cultivate a healthy body image, and direct your daughter to the section just for the girls.

Image credit: AP/Chris Pizzello/Boston Globe.

Note: If you’re a Mad Men fan — and I know you all want to be – be sure to check out my latest Pop Culture and Politics column about the mixed messages we received from the media over the past 10 days about what we want and expect from American career women.

I donned my TV critic’s cap and dished with one of the two Manic Mommies about the new fall television season, the national political conventions, the Olympics, Mad Men, 90210, The Office and what I think about the title of the new CBS show, The Mentalist.

You can get directions on how to download/listen to the Manic Mommies podcast here. (It’s a radio show on the internet, for the uninitiated.) Or you can just go to iTunes and download it for free — gotta love the free! – to listen to our sparklingly witty conversation.

Image credit: Manic Mommies.

Fans of AMC’s critically acclaimed early 1960s drama Mad Men have no doubt noticed that folks tended to raise their children a tad bit differently when John F. Kennedy was the president than people do now. Not has a child on Mad Men repeatedly been shown fixing drinks for adults, but parents’ friends have slapped misbehaving youth and a pregnant woman openly drank, smoked and consumed caffeinated coffee, all considered no-no’s for today’s gestating ladies.

The most recent Mad Men episode was chock-full of examples of how much parenting has changed:

By watching the exploits of lead characters Don and Betty Draper and their grade-school-aged kids, Sally and Bobby, viewers saw Betty demand that Don spank their son in order to teach the boy right from wrong, particularly after he’d repeatedly lied to his mother. When Don refused to do so — instead disciplined Bobby by saying, “Mommy says you broke the hi-fi. I believe her. Don’t do it again.” and then telling him to go bed – Betty challenged Don, asking him if he thought he’d be the man he is if his father hadn’t spanked him.

Later in the episode, Don had to take Sally to work with him, where the girl received . . . an education. (See video here.)

But, ironically, the recent Mad Men show also dramatized examples of how parenting hasn’t changed completely, despite the passage of 40 years:

Bobby and Sally walked in on Don and Betty when they were in bed one morning as the parents were at the very beginning of gettin’ busy (Don was on top of Betty, but under the sheets). Don ordered the kids out of the room as they asked what was going on. ”We’re . . . (*pause*) sleeping,” Don said gruffly.

During another fight about Don’s “style” of discipline, Betty told her husband that she was tired of being trapped at home all day, “outnumbered” by the kids, only to have him come home and be “the hero.” (The “hero” thing happens at our house all the time.)

FYI: If you’re a Mad Men fan, please join me every Monday on my Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum blog where I discuss the latest episode and all things Draper.

Item #1: Adam@Home

I’ve been loving the latest Brian Basset cartoons, Adam@Home, where a work-from-home dad named Adam (has three kids and a wife who works elsewhere) is fielding online questions about what it’s like to work at home with kids bustling about and fighting. This week’s cartoons have cut a wee bit too close to my life’s experience as a work-from-home parent. I have several of the comic strips up on the fridge and in my home office that regularly make me laugh, though, sadly, the humor is lost on the children.

Item #2: thirtysomething Online

Shh! I’ve got a secret. If, like me, you’ve been waiting patiently (or in my case impatiently) for the 1980s thoughtful yuppie drama thirtysomething to be released on DVD (or VHS) and cannot, for the life of you, understand why it hasn’t come out yet, I have a solution for you. Try YouTube. Type in “thirtysomething.” Scroll down the page and you won’t be disappointed.

After watching many of the episodes which are 20+ years old, I find that — fashion aside — they hold up well, particularly when it comes to the angst one of the lead characters, Hope Steadman (Mel Harris) felt about working parenthood. (During the series, she wound up working outside the home after being an at-home mom for a while.) The clip below is from the first episode of the second season after Hope had decided to go back to work at an environmental magazine when her daughter was 20 months old. She and her husband Michael were also debating whether to have another child.

 Item #3: Halloween ALREADY!

It’s the first full week of August. My family just got back from our summer vacation, and what am I finding, other than beach sand still littering the mini-van? Halloween stuff for sale in stores and e-mails in my inbox from Halloween costumer purveyors. This initial Halloween appearance seems earlier than last year when I first spotted Halloween products while shopping for my twins’ late summer birthday party supplies. I say to you premature Halloween pushers: No mas! It’s scary enough to think about back-to-school shopping (school idiotically starts BEFORE Labor Day around these parts), I don’t need the added pressure of Halloween costume shopping.

Item #1: No ‘Bliss’ for Real Moms

Galt Niederhoffer wants all of you mommies to knock it off with your mommy propaganda, saying stuff like “motherhood is bliss” because, as she says on The Huffington Post, it’s not. In her post entitled, “The Bliss Myth: Cut the Crap Mommies,” Niederhoffer wrote:

“Why not acknowledge that frustration, boredom, guilt and ambivalence are universal, unavoidable facets of motherhood? Sharing will make us better and happier mothers, affording women the comfort of community and the benefit of shared information — the very tools we need to transcend motherhood’s challenges.”

Well, if Niederhoffer had been reading the Picket Fence Post, she would’ve never gotten the misguided notion that parenthood is bliss. Maybe I should e-mail her a few links to places where she can get a reality check on what real, non-blissed-out parenting is like here on Planet Earth.

Item #2: Family Meals Good for Parents Too

Speaking of real parenting . . . Slate’s Emily Bazelton tells us that while we’ve all heard about how absolutely fantastic and grounding it is for children to sit down with their parents for family meals each night — family-meal-eating kids are less likely to get into trouble, are more likely to feel closer to their family, get higher grades, become rocket scientists, etc. – it’s also good for parents too. Bazelton wrote:

“The research by lead author Jenet Jacob of Brigham Young University found that among 1,580 parents who worked at IBM, those who said their jobs interfered less with being home for dinner tended to feel greater personal success, and success in relationships with their spouses and their children. The working parents — both mothers and fathers — had all of these buoyant feelings if they made it home for dinner more regularly, even if they still worked long hours. They also felt more kindly toward their workplace.”

I know I’d certainly feel better if The Spouse were home more often for family meals, then I wouldn’t be the only one to develop a migraine when the kids say they utterly loathe what I’ve made for dinner (there’s always at least one protester per meal), then watch them sulk and, in at least the case of one child, literally throw up all over the kitchen table in order to avoid eating the baked chicken. Good times.

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Item #1: An American Girl + Great Depression=Kit Kittredge

Took The Girl to see Kit Kittredge: An American Girl with my neighbors and their daughters, and several plastic, overpriced dolls. Was pleasantly surprised to see that the film, which is set during the Great Depression, didn’t completely sugar-coat the struggles families endured, such as having the bank repossess family houses (and businesses), having to take in boarders to earn money, seeing fathers leave their families in search of employment and having to keep chickens in order to sell their eggs. The story was told through the eyes of grade schooler Kit Kittredge (Abigail Breslin) who, much to my giddy delight, aspired to be a reporter and toiled away in the attic on her typewriter.

“I don’t ever want to live in a Depression,” The Girl told me afterward, saying that it must’ve been “very hard and awful.” Days later, she used one of the ancient, manual typewriters I have in my office and typed out her very own summary of the film. A sample of The Girl’s summary: “Kit and Ruthy and their school class had to help in the soup kitchen. The soup kitchen was a place where people who needed food could eat. When they got there Kit saw her father. Then she knew he had lost his job. She was right.”

Item #2: TCM’s ‘Essentials Jr.’

Speaking of Abigail Breslin . . . she and her Kittredge co-star Chris O’Donnell have been co-hosting a Sunday night series on the Turner Classic Movies channel called, TCM Essentials Jr., where, each week, a classic, family friendly film is aired at 8 p.m. This week’s feature is Meet Me in St. Louis, a film, which I am embarrassed to say, I’ve never seen but one that Breslin says is a favorite of hers. Other upcoming films to be aired: Roman Holiday on August 3 and Yours, Mine and Ours on August 24.

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