I don’t know which is worse, that I remember a scene I watched once in 1992 or that I’m still getting so many of my ideas from pop culture. I mean, I think I get most of my values from church, from the family dinners my parents conducted every night at 6 pm my whole childhood, but lately I’ve had sex on the brain, and movies and TV and the New York Times have had a lot of good things to say about it.

On Glee, there was a line about how it’s not who you’re attracted to, it’s who you fall in love with, and on the Op-Ed page of the Times there was a great piece on Why Monogamy Matters, where the conclusion from recent research is that “a high sexual ideal can shape how quickly and casually people pair off, even when they aren’t living up to its exacting demands. The ultimate goal is a sexual culture that makes it easier for young people to achieve romantic happiness — by encouraging them to wait a little longer, choose more carefully and judge their sex lives against a strong moral standard.”

Sometimes it’s hard for me to balance reality with idealism, especially when it comes to what I want my kids to know. And this is particularly important for my daughters, because that research shows that female promiscuity is strongly correlated to depression. This sounds sexist, but really it’s practical biology. (Not to mention backed up by my faith — which encourages chastity and fidelity for women and men.)

Last week Tom and I watched Easy A, and while it definitely earned it’s PG-13 rating (and then some, for language and theme, though nothing actually happens), it was a fantastic movie. I love high school movies in general, and one that pays homage to 80s John Hughes flicks and Nathaniel Hawthorne? Sign me up! The more I think about it, I’ll probably watch it with Avery in a couple of years, when I’m ready to take The Talk a little further.

A couple years ago I had to encourage someone who is more pure and innocent than most five-year-olds I know to get STD testing after her husband left her. Things happen. I don’t expect my daughters to be perfect. I wasn’t, and am not perfect, but there has to be a way to balance the high ideal we’re never going to give up and the reality that we’re human beings in a imperfect world. In Easy A, which is about truth and reputation/perception and gossip and friendship and family, the school counselor says something about this being a time in your life to make mistakes and explore but that she doesn’t want something to happen (unplanned pregnancy, STD) that will define you for the rest of your life.

That’s what I want to do for my girls — not by handing out condoms necessarily, as the school counselor does (though I have thought before that if I had a wild daughter, I’d take her in for a depo shot), but by teaching them and being available enough to them that while they’re free to discover who they really are, hopefully we can keep them safe from the type of decision that can’t be undone.

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I am participating in the Let’s Talk about STDs Campaign for RapidSTDtesting.com. I memorized Some Kind of Wonderful and had four daughters I now have to teach about all this stuff all on my own. (Ok, Tom helped with the daughters — but NOT with SKOW.)

And I thought, yesterday, that I know I’m not a Mozart, and I have not the discipline or drive of a Salieri, or the wit of an Edmond Rostand, for that matter. But as long as I can be audience to human pageants such as these — well, I’d rather weep over a tragic romance than rage in frustration at a mundane lack of sleep.

So tell me — what was the first play or book or movie that moved you, made you feel so connected to someone/something a hundred years or miles away? For Avery (she won’t remember this), it was the scene in Castaway where Wilson floats away on the sea. She was two years old, and I don’t know, maybe the music was that evocative or maybe it was enough that he was losing a ball, but she was inconsolable.

Sally, age 8, uttered that phrase all parents wait for this week when she asked if she could read Twilight. “But all my friends are reading it,” she said, when I told her no. (The funny thing about that is that she knew to ask. She doesn’t ever ask if she can read Charlie Bone or Enola Holmes, though we did have discussions about the later Harry Potter books last July.)

I said no, in part, because after watching New Moon at midnight with Chrysanthemum, who was my midnight-Twilight buddy last year, and Sharla, I went home and made my husband very, very happy.

Not that New Moon is great; it’s actually not even as good as the first one (which itself wasn’t very good at all except as a fantasy made celluloid). Oh, the makeup’s a little better, and … well, to be honest the best thing about it is Jacob’s chest. The music (one of the highlights of the first) was horrible. Either totally unsuited to the mood of a scene or completely over-the-top. (I think I stole that line from Sharla, but I was thinking it!)

Bella’s personality and motivations, never very sympathetic or believable, take a turn to the maniacally-self-destructive-self-hating, which can’t be blamed on anything but Stephenie Meyer. But the worst part is Edward, who is okay, if whiny-emo, at the beginning, but after an hour or so of reveling in the (literal) warmth of Jacob’s friendship and muscles, Edward, at the climactic moment in Italy, stepping out into the sunlight, looks like an angel hair noodle with bits of pubic hair pepper stuck to him.

Not appealing, in other words. Emotionally, mentally, or physically. Three strikes and you’re out, baby!

I’ve never bought that romance (and I read a lot of romance) is emotional you-know-what for women. I’ll take my level-headed, laid-back, not-libido-driven, loving husband any day over any fictional character, no matter how sparkly. But as far as regular you-know-what, New Moon apparently delivers (ask Mr. Bennet).

Which is why Sally may never read the books or watch the movies. (She will, but not any time soon.)

As we stood in line for popcorn last night (the outing itself was great fun and something I should probably do more than once a year), we talked to a mom and her eight-year old daughter. The girl was really cute. Cute clothes, blonde hair in a grown-up cut, dangly earrings. She loves the books, and she will probably have a wonderful life. Sally next to her would look old-fashioned, young, and probably repressed by a censoring mother.

And to that I say: you’re welcome.

—-

For Sharla, here’s the post where I compared Stephenie Meyer and Shannon Hale.

*Image from Fanpop.

(I loathe montages, those cop-out mishmashes set to thematic music that are supposed to take the place of pivotal transition action. The worst montage of all time, is, of course, the speech montage in that movie sort of inspired by J.D. Salinger — the one with the cute black boy and Sean Connery as the reclusive writer? In the climactic scene where Sean Connery (a famous, eccentric, brilliant writer) leaves his apartment for the first time in seventeen years to read a speech at the cute black boy’s school and as soon as he steps to the lectern to give his speech, a godless montage of camera shots and “inspirational” music takes the place of, you know, words.

It’s a travesty, basically.)

While The Proposal doesn’t commit that most egregious of all cinematic sins, it’s quite a letdown in other ways. From the tired orphan issues and daddy issues (Sandra Bullock’s and Ryan Renold’s characters, respectively) to the apology-to-the-family scene near the end that I think is actually identical to the  speech in While You Were Sleeping, it’s all-cliche, all-the-time, and not in a cheeky sort of way.

I’m really not much of a feminist (I mean, I stay at home, and only recently started mowing the lawn again), but the portrayal of Margaret as a scary boss strikes me as sexism of the worst sort. When she fires an underling who is demonstrably lazy and ineffectual, she says he has two months to find another job and that he can tell everyone he quit. And she never makes personal remarks or raises her voice. Sounds pretty fair to me, but what do I know? I haven’t worked in an office in seven years. Maybe male executives fire goof-offs by giving them raises and holding their hands in a purely platonic manner.

But the biggest strike against The Proposal is that it failed to convince me that Margaret and Andrew have any warmer feelings for each other than I do for tapioca pudding. I like tapioca, I’ll eat it, especially when my dad flexes his cooking muscles once every six months and whips up a batch in the microwave, but I’m not going to weep if we’re kept apart by a tragic blood feud, okay?

Ryan Reynolds and Sandra Bullock are cute of course, and witty enough. They even have a kind of reverse-Sabrina take-a-break scene complete with Frenchy-artist scarf for Margaret and a consistent give-and-take comraderie, but they don’t fall in love.

My cousin was (understandably) disturbed by the nudey scene, but the truth is that I would gladly sit through raw footage of octopus-unicorn sex if at the end of the day I’m convinced that Miss Tentacles and Mr. Sparkly are going to happily populate the world with octocorns and enjoy seventy years of maritime bliss.

After all, don’t I have kids? Don’t I know what it’s like to be looked at by people who don’t have kids? Don’t I know how frustrating it is to have to miss out on things simply because you’ve given birth to a needy infant?

Don’t I like to take my kids to the movies? (Yes, at the FAMILY DOLLAR THEATER TO SEE KIDS’ SHOWS.)

But really. People pay 8 bucks a ticket (or work hard enough in their careers to be given complimentary tickets) to attend a PG-13 movie on opening weekend, and you bring your crying baby, and sit right behind me.

And I? I have spent two hours of my Friday afternoon making calls to potential sitters, and shelled out twenty-five dollars of my hard-earned blogging money (which you know took me two weeks to earn) for a babysitter, and I’m out on the town on a date with my husband, without my kids, enjoying a fantastic movie, and you expect me to LISTEN TO YOUR FREAKING CRYING BABY THE WHOLE TIME?

Major fail, Mother with the crying baby, major fail.

Please stay home, or get a babysitter, before you give all mothers a bad name, and me a major pain in the hiney.

I don’t want to spoil anything, but I have some thoughts.

1. Where were the women, Gene? Where?

2. The romance? It is sweet. I don’t even care that it’s not “authentic.”

3. I wish we could get these guys to go back and re-do all the old Star Treks. The old ones were good, they were competent for the most part, and often interesting, sometimes moving. I’m not the biggest fan around, but I know enough to say that the whale one (Star Trek IV?) is my favorite, with Insurrection a close second. The TV shows? Enh. Nice as far as TV shows go. In a way it’s kind of a blessing to not be so invested in the mythology of Star Trek, because I’m not upset by any of the “re-writing of history” as my movie row-mate complained, half-heartedly, because even he really liked it. (And, no, that wasn’t Dick citing Star Trek lore; it was Joseph Scott of Automattic. I took the geek opportunity to let him know what’s wrong with the latest version of WordPress. Love you, WordPress! And good luck to Joseph’s lovely wife Sarah, who’s going to pop with their third baby in a couple months!)

4. So why say the old ones could be even better with this team re-imagining them? Remember Amadeus? And the part where Salieri is playing his piece, and it’s okay, it’s fine, it’s not bad. It’s gonna keep him his job as the Emporer’s composer-stooge-boy for another few years. Then Mozart sits down and tweaks it just that little bit and it is suddenly magic? That’s what this Star Trek is like. Virtuoso. (And the soundtrack is fine, too!)

5. The triumph of emotion over reason. Or the body over the mind. I don’t think it’s giving anything away if I tell you that Kirk ends up as captain of the Enterprise, and Spock as his first officer, and not the other way around. What exactly, besides hot blue eyes, makes Kirk the superior in terms of command? Spock’s strength is conventionally assumed to be his rationality, his imperviousness to messy emotion. Kirk and Spock are seen as being perfect complements to each other because one embodies logic and the other feeling. But really, Spock has these seething emotions, he’s just better at controlling them. Until he isn’t, and then, since he’s not used to experiencing them in a normal manner, he goes Minnesota-Nordic berserker and ruins everything for himself. Kirk, on the other hand, takes insane risks and is cocky, blah blah blah, but actually, he is the wiser man because he is a blend of both reason and emotion. I’m not even sure he really needs Spock for his cool head, but I’m glad he thinks he does.

6. And the women? Gene, the women! This movie is almost biblical, or okay, definitely mythological in that two of the three main women characters (if “main women characters” is not a total oxymoron) are mothers. And as mothers, they rock! So while I’d like to see some kick-Romulan-hiney females, I can appreciate the fine mother characters.

(How do you say “Happy Mother’s Day” in Klingon?)

No — if you liked the books (the Twilight books, that is), you’ll probably like the movie. Even though Edward seems to be fighting dysenterial vomiting at the beginning rather than a burning desire for Bella’s blood, and even though Rosalie looks fat and ugly. (Sorry. I realize she’s probably a size 2, but her bum is big, and she’s not very pretty — should’ve tried Jennifer Siebel from Life).

Wow, looks like we're in need of a feeding. Know of any good deer herds 'round here?

Charlie, oh Charlie. Charlie is the awkward character in the books, the father with no idea what to do with his preternaturally “mature” daughter. In the movie, Charlie is the only character who acts rationally and says anything that actually makes sense. Plus he’s a lot yummier and younger than I had imagined. Let me comfort you, Charlie!

The biggest problem with the movie? (Besides the after-school special feel of several scenes and the pancake makeup over 7 o’clock shadows and the mushroom hair and too much lipstick on the men)?

Whereas while reading the books you can mentally insert Romeo and Juliet star-crossed lover-ness, blahblahblah, in a movie theater crowded with the target audience predisposed to LOVELOVELOVE the movie, there were way too many “romantic/tragic/romantic” scenes that got laughs instead.

I’m not sure why, but maybe it was just too much of a stretch to imagine any un-lobotomized person saying (out loud, in public, on purpose) “You won’t hurt me” “I trust you” “I DON’T CARE” upon first learning that the object of her desire is a vampire who wants nothing more on earth than to drain her body of blood.

I know you’re in love, it’s uncontrollable, it’s emotional, it’s perfect (except it’s not), and it’s sooooo REAL, but, geez, maybe you want to take a few minutes to think it over before extending your neck to someone not sure they can control themselves from KILLING YOU?

Hmm. Not sure why Chrysanthemum still looks hungry here. Girl needs a feeding, bad.

That said, I had a lot of fun going to the midnight showing with my Seagull Fountain friend Chrysanthemum, who was able to see Mormon themes of eternal life and perfected bodies and committed L.O.V.E., in the film. I only beg her that we not be covered in glitter after the Resurrection. Please?

Yeah, don't think those Rasinets are gonna do it, Chrys.

What’d you think? (And have you bought stock in Summit Entertainment yet?)

Jane

I think her name was Hailey, and I know it sounds weird that I for sure remember what her father’s occupation was, but it was something of a scandal that those respectable people showed a vampire flick (with great 80s music) to a bunch of 6th graders.

Like American Idol’s Brooke White, we weren’t supposed to watch R-rated movies, even with a parent or guardian (I know my mom’s never seen one; not sure about my dad). It’s strange, but also kind of nice that I got to act out quite a bit at college simply by playing pool, drinking Mountain Dew, and watching R-rated movies.

Now I’m older and wiser, and more importantly, have children of my own, and so I don’t want to bring a lot of extra sex and violence and cussing into our home. Not that I let the kids watch grown-up movies even edited, but sometimes they don’t stay in bed when mom and dad are watching a movie. And maybe, just maybe, I don’t need that much graphic reality myself anymore. I still want to watch cool movies, though.

Enter Clearplay, a dvd player with update-able filters for most popular R and PG-13 movies. The dvd player is about 70 bucks, and a year’s subscription (including their entire backlist and filters for that year’s movies) costs about 80. Single filters are $2.99 each.

We recently watched The Kingdom, In the Valley of Elah, and Rendition. Thought-provoking and maddening and heart-breaking movies, and I’m glad I saw them. They were just as powerful without the graphic violence. Perhaps even more so for what was now hinted at, suggested, already-happened. They’re all really about war/terror’s aftermath anyway. Which can be just as horrific without the gruesome images and understandably coarse language. I don’t need movies to tell me what to think about a tragedy, but sometimes it takes a well-told story to help me imagine the human cost of things taking place halfway around the world.

On a lighter note, I watched the Drew Barrymore/Adam Sandler movie 50 First Dates on Clearplay and found it charming, whimsical, and totally romantic. Later I rented it again and popped it in, forgetting that I’d seen it first edited. The first crude joke was a jolt. Where was my charming, loveable movie? I don’t expect life to be like a Disney movie (though if it were like Enchanted, I wouldn’t complain), but sometimes I like to kick back and enjoy, without feeling like I’m changing poopy diapers even after the kids are asleep.

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Clearplay’s what works for me this week. Head over to RIMD for more great tips.

If I ever started smoking (I have no immediate plans to) it’d only be so I could be like the too-cool and unsentimental Lauren Bacall in To Have and Have Not. Or, if it must be Disney, that great cartoon villainess Cruella DeVille — what greater proof of cynicism than a desire to wear puppies?

I never thought I’d get married — too busy enjoying traumatic, unrequited crushes on the Adam who thought I was a shrew rather than the Adam who asked me to the junior prom. Wasn’t that a nasty shock, learning his last name after a friend of a friend had passed on the invitation from, simply, Adam.

And thanks to Cody Braithwaite for breaking my heart in 6th grade, and 7th grade, and 8th grade. Then my family moved. If you’d kept your promises of undying love in the 5th grade, my kids would be freakishly tall, and I might never have met Dick. I still have your family’s home phone number memorized, -5303. I think.

No, I planned to be a doctor or lawyer: the basic career options for someone with above-average grades and enough passion and imagination for absolutely nothing. Instead I found Prince Charming at 20 and popped out the first of three princess-pony-ballerinas at 23.

That early fairytale-ending imprinting can be impossible to shake, even when devoured alongside copious amounts of Andrew Lang and Hans Christian Anderson’s early reality-television-fairytale versions.

Happily ever after really is a lie. It’s irritating ever after and cheering up ever after, and ever after not packing the diaper bag (him), ever after moaning when we’re sick, ever after irrational tantrums (me), ever after making me laugh, ever after being interested in what interests him and what interests me.

At great risk of passing on the ever after virus, we took our girls to Enchanted at the dollar theater. Sally wore her Cinderella dress and laughed a lot: often with the audience, sometimes all by herself. Susan wore a Mrs. Santa costume from last Christmas and said the end was too scary. Spot screeched and tripped on fallen popcorn and slid around on old soda stains and screeched some more.

I looked over at Dick and saw him with Sally’s head on his shoulder, his arm around her. I felt all mushy inside, like I wanted to squeeze both of them to me forever and never let Sally grow up. And thinking that if only she can find a Prince Charming of her own like her dad, I will be happy to let her go. Maybe.

But I’m turning over a new leaf. I’m becoming a model mother. Getting involved so I can say (honestly), No, we don’t homeschool, but we’re completely involved with the kids’ education.

Actually, when I checked the little red heart box indicating I’d be ‘happy to help out with the Valentine’s Day party,’ I kinda hoped that the Don’t You Feel Guilty For Not Volunteering paper would get lost somewhere between our car and Mrs. Machol’s classroom.

Instead, turns out that everyone signed up to ‘help out‘ with the party, and no one to ‘take the lead.’ Which shouldn’t be that surprising. If you don’t even get to ‘be in charge,’ why would you sign up to get all the responsibility and none of the power?

Possibly because she sensed what a great party planner I’d be (or that I was ripe for guilt-induced effort), Mrs. Machol asked me to take the lead.

I did and it was fantastic. Sally thinks I am the best mom ever. The end.

Here’s what I learned for next time. You might want to take some notes, especially if you (like me) have irrational (or not so irrational) fears of being like Kurt Russell’s drunk dad in Follow Me Boys.

I’d much rather be Fred MacMurray, the Disney dad/boy scout troup leader extraordinaire. Fred would never be twenty minutes late to an important scout night, dripping melting ice cream on the other parents.

How to not be like Whitey’s drunk dad

1. Don’t put off printing your bingo cards until the night before.
2. Don’t put off buying a new ink cartridge till the night before.
3. Don’t live in a state with sudden bad snowstorms the night before.
4. Do have good friends with printers and ink to go in them.
5. Do befriend over-coordinated room-grandmothers who just happen to pick up awesome supplies (cookies, juice boxes, and fruit snacks) during their monthly Sam’s Club run.
6. Don’t call the other mothers after 9:45 pm unless you know they’re on the way to their 10-4 shift at UPS. And if you do know that, don’t call anyway, because dwelling on the fact that another mom works nights so she can be with her kids during the day and help out with school parties ON PURPOSE will only make you feel greedy, inadequate, and lazy.

All that excruciating preparation minimal planning and moments of blind, staring panic paid off in the sweetest way possible. Mrs. Machol told me it was a great party and probably doesn’t think I’m a delinquent mother anymore.

Sally ran up to hug me during the party. Three times. And introduced me to all her friends. I’m afraid to help out with more parties; at some point, in one year or two, maybe five if I’m lucky, she won’t run up to me like that and she might hope no one guesses we’re related. (Might?) Of course, I could always pull out Follow Me Boys and threaten to bring the ice cream if I don’t get some love.