Thursday, January 17, 2008

channel surfing through society

Sometimes it's hard for me not to disdain the world out there. Well, its humans, anyway.

I often wake up in the middle of the night. It used to be at three something, lately it's a little after two.
There is an ancient wisdom (I'll have to look it up to be more specific) that says something like "The morning has secrets to tell you. Do not go back to sleep. Do not go back to sleep." This comes from the idea that the world around us is the most quiet at around three a.m., and that if you listen carefully, you'll find your Truths and wisdom in the silence.
Sometimes I get up, and get out of bed. Sometimes I go back to sleep.
Usually I grab the television's remote before I commit either way.

Have you cruised through channels in the middle of the night?
This is where my enmity has come from.
I landed on I think it was Mtv, and there was a girl there showing us riveted folks at home her pink labels on her hummer's hubcaps. Fascinating stuff, that.
I kept wondering "who is this, and why is she telling me this?" (Cribs, I believe.)
I was asking Eric yesterday if he knew anything about the Britney Spears thing. I said "there is something about her and her family, but I'm not sure what it is. Do you know?" No, he said. No help there. The best bit of info I gleaned was something about she shaved her head a while back to mock the people that follow her around - paparazzi. "Well, that's something," I thought. Even if it's a "screw you" to all this nonsense.
Anyway, one of my least favorites is the show/commercial where the guy sits on the couch, and talks with three or four reasonably young women about how important the size of their partner's anatomy is. Evidently it's imperative that the world be aware that you can do something about it, if only you will.

It's difficult to not assume that this is the sort of thing that people want to watch - for it's on. Would it be on, if no one was interested? Seems unlikely.
So - who is clamoring for this stuff?
One of my least favorite kind of shows in general (besides Cops, which I detest for a number of reasons) are the Hollywood entertainment shows. I just don't care. If I stretched it, I could probably come up with two or three dozen actors and actresses.

I'm not angry at all, or even slightly disgusted, really, now that I've thought about it for a couple of hours - I'm just wondering what my place in it is.
I was wondering about my judgments of it - such things that to me seem really superficial and nonsensical - and how I could come to terms with this huge part of my society.
I understand entertainment. Well, maybe I don't understand it, exactly (sports, entertainment tonight, hollywood marriages), what I mean is that I understand that people feel the need to suspend their lives for a moment, and escape into something else.
But I was wondering how to get passed the momentary judgment.
And I was judging.

Strangely, the answer I came to was "This is not Yours."
That's all.
No judgments. No thoughts of contempt. No rolling of the eyes.
Just "This is not Yours."

It does not belong to you. It is not there for you.

See it, notice it, write about it if you must, :), and then move along.
"Oh. Well, then. Yes. Yes, I see."

Funny.
It's gone, now.

No contempt. No thoughts of foolishness. No disdain for adulation or hero worship for those showing off their sparklies.

I'm left with the quiet knowledge that it's just not there for me.

I feel much better about it, now.

So.... should I go back to bed?

6 comments:

EC said...

yes. put down the remote and get back into bed and have warm snuggly dreams.

Stephanie said...

mmmmm, I did, too.(three and a half hours after I woke up.)
And it was soooo delicious.
You know that kind of sleep where you feel so divine and decadent, just snuggly deliciousness?
That's what I had.
How lovely.
Two lovely beginnings to this day.

piscesgrrl said...

Perhaps we were up at the same time? The dog woke me cuz she had to pee. I glanced while I waited, it was 3:44. So the eerie thing is, as I took Brady and two neighbor kids to school, the carpool grrrl says she woke last night at 3:44. WHOA. What does it mean?

I waited for my dog. And waited. And enjoyed the burst of cold air after being warm and toasty under the quilts. And just when I finally nabbed a blanket and snuggled on the couch, the dog barked to be let in. Apparently the witching hour got her attn too, because she was out there a long while!

But no crud-tv for me. Though i won't even tell you what my husband stumbled upon the other night. No, not p*rn. Something on Jack*ss I think. OY.

Julie said...

I also wake occasionally in the middle of the night, and I too reach for the remote:) For me when I come across shows like you are referring, they interest me perhaps for a different reason. I watch them and it's almost like their so far removed from most people's (mine) reality, that their much less reality than say a sitcom or a "non-reality" show. It's like wathcing aliens on another planet if you will, because I just can't fathom a life/lifestyle anywhere close to a celebrity's. For the most part I watch and am amused, and there's a judgement here and there (appalled to hear that Madonna spends $30,000 a month on specially blessed Kabbalah water that she has shipped to wherever she is staying for her & her family to drink). For the most part though it's just watching and listening to something I just can't quite begin to understand or fathom that kind of life.

After watching shows like that, It actually makes me very happy to be where I am and living the live that I'm living alongside my children. This is the life as far as I'm concerned.

Stephanie said...

Julie -
It's not even mainly the celeb stuff - have you seen that ad for a new show on A&E called "Parking Wars", or something like that?
It's about parking meter people and the people they give tickets to. ?? And all those "reality" fighting in the house shows, and on and on it goes. Oh - and Hugh Heffner's house - although I can see why some would be interested in that!! :)
Though I really have no idea about his sex appeal....
Anyway - I was just pleased to get to a place where I could look at it without derision.
It just is what it is.
I'm just glad to be past a place where I think society is made up of a bunch of... um, ... er.... well, ... dunderheads!

Julie said...

I know, it spans the channels from celebrities to reality shows. It's the same though with the reality shows, even though their not celebrities, my life is so far removed from it I just don't understand it really. I'm not so much judging (I'll make an offhand comment occasionally to Lee or something), but it's just that it seems alien to me, like I never see people interacting like that in "real" life, or even hear secondhand about someone behaving the way a lot of the people do on those shows. I think I too can look at it the same as you in that "it is what it is", as in this is who these people are and even though I don't understand it/them, they seem to be trying to understand their life and are on some sort of path whatever it may be.