My So Called Life

I spent the last few weeks watching My So Called Life. I loved this show when I was in middle school and loved it even more now. The story lines were smart and simple, yet carried weight and understanding of what it is really like to be a high school student, rather than the shows that highlight overpriced bags, unfortunate fashion, and bad haircuts.

Claire Danes is so cute and interesting. She carries emotion and the character of Angela so well. She is smart, funny, and she does this interesting lip quiver thing when she is about to cry. The shows script is so well written and I love the quirky characters. I love that they have the characters have the same clothing that they wear in multiple episodes.

I am going to take a time out and talk about my love for the fashion in this show. I love the flannel. I love the flannel on flannel. I love the dr. martens she wore with slouchy black socks. I love that Jared Leto always wore those striped sweaters. I love that Ray Ann always had these crazy put together outfits with that sack bag. I love the fashion and if you see me lately I will be wearing flannel. I love it and I desire to bring it back.

It's interesting to watch this show as an adult. I liked following the mom character and how hard core she was to following the rules and the American way of life than sitting back and listening to what her kids are going through. I guess I am wrestling with the ideas and identity of perfection. I think it's hard growing up and knowing how to do the right thing. What is this right thing anymore? What are we trying to do and how are we trying to live? Are we going to get over the fact that there isn't really one right way to live? and to love?

I am not sure if there are answers for this. When I finished watching the season I realized how good it was and how relevant it still is today. I think we are still wrestling with these issues with students there are just different clothes and different musical tastes but the issues are still the same.

Women and the Body

I have been lucky this quarter to have two directed readings. A directed reading is doing a lot of reading and than working one on one with a professor to talk about the reading. It's fantastic because than I don't have to go to class!! As of now I am working with the concepts of body, theology, and advertising. The other is the Christian perspective to divide the secular from the sacred. The two are starting to merge themselves together which couldn't make me happier.

Women's issues and the church are rarely merged together and when they are they have a specific women's ministry that usually talks about domestic home issues or raising children. I usually don't fit in that category because I am a horrible domestic and my womb is not full or have ever been full with children. Me aside, the issues I have been reading about has made me look at the world around me, and specifically women on television, a bit differently.

I am getting over being sick so Sunday evening I spent the day with books and my couch. It was a lovely day but I need distraction and hence the glory of television. The public kind...I don't receive or pay for cable. The portrayal of women are interesting. I think the jog is up on the fact that thin is in and there is only one certain kind of woman so they (as in the TV people) will put brown hair white woman, black woman, or hispanic woman in the place of the enduring blonde but the issues stay the same. Who is prettier, what is the woman doing, where is she working, what are the main issues? Often times I see the women dealing with petty things (or what I what I see is petty) like getting their hair done, nails re-polished. The issue is who is the man in their life. Beauty and the Geek, Americas Next Top Model, Deal or No Deal...what is the common function of the show? What are these women doing? and how are they succeeding? Across the line women are paid to be beautiful..

In one of my books I read the phrase, something of which I will paraphrase, as women have in the past not had authority with their words so their authority has been moved over to their body. Their body is what gave them power. Are we manipulating the body still today? Are we still finding the authority or even worth in a woman for the look of their body or the work of their hands, the brilliance of their thoughts? and when a woman is brilliant she is usually white, thin, and characteristically pretty.

Are we really moving forward with women's issues or are we stagnant? I will let you be the judge.

Pushing Daises

Well I was pleasantly surprised last night when I watched the first episode of the new show Pushing Daisies. It was almost as if I was pushed into a land mixed with Tim Burton, Dr. Seuss, and Roald Dahl. It was quirky, bright, colorful, humor was dry, and the story line interesting.

The premise of the story is this guy Ned (of course his name is Ned!) and Ned can raise people from the dead, but only for one minute, after that someone elses life will be taken. If this person is touched again by him or they touch him they will die, never to be touched again, and never to be raised from the dead. I think it's interesting because it brings up the issue of touch, the promise of a juicy story line because there is all this tension about him and his friend "Chuck" who is a girl and he raises her from the dead.

I loved the colors in the show. They were bright and there were certain scenes where the quirky waitress from the Pie shop, Neds shop and profession, wheres the same robe as the wallpaper and couch fabric. There were shots of the main characters as children who imagine crushing a make believe world as they are huge child-like monsters. I love anything that merges child like wonder into adult life situations. I think that's why I love Tim Burton's work so much or the stories of Dahl. Which, by the way, Wes Anderson is making an animated story about The Fantastic Mr. Fox.

I am looking forward to seeing where this show goes. I hope people watch it because most shows on TV that I end up liking end up getting kicked off the air (Studio 60 and Arrested Development). Dry humor and quirky plot lines don't go over well on American TV. It is disappointing...let's be honest. So here is to hoping for this show to survive. I like being pushed into other worlds and other ways of seeing life. Chuck sells honey that she makes and the money goes to the homeless. It's funny...quirky. I guess thats a lot like me.

Is the Price Right?

Sick days at the Kaherl house usually meant missing school, laying helplessly on the green sofa usually with a glass of orange juice and hoping my mom would bring home McDonalds cheeseburgers. Like clockwork at eleven the channel would be switched to the Price is Right, knowing that you were one of the few kids that encountered the day time television show.

Today I am not ill but found myself on my lovely lime green chair hoping that I could pick the right price on a horrible sculpture being hawked on the popular show. It hit me this morning as I laughed at the prizes being won, the horrible movements of Barkers beauties, and the funny games being played that this show really is against everything I fight for in my work and studies. It's funny that I really despise the over consumer nature of our American population as well our television and movies push the overly large breasted women with little personality but a wink and a smile.

It's funny how most of childhood and then reflections of my childhood always included the Price is Right. I don't think that this show is inherently bad but the reputation of the show usually is discussed as one of Americas favorite game show. It adheres to American values of the almighty dollar and 'beautiful' women. After all this is what we need to be successful in our culture, more things and a beautiful woman to sell it to you. It is a perfect example of how we value and what we value in our American society.

It will be interesting to see what happens once Bob Barker leaves the show. Will it lose it's beauties? I hear that Rosie O'Donnell might be the host of show, would that mean a whole new setup, will there be glitz, glamour, and Koosh balls? One can only make speculation at this point in time, but it will be interesting to see what happens if the values will change and could America change through time.

I will Survive?

It is a Saturday afternoon, and to those who may not know, I have an affinity to the Saturday morning lineup of cartoons. I like the art and design and the plot lines that try to teach kids morality as well as hopefully giving a little chuckle. I like the cartoons. You can make fun of me....I can take it.

The reason the cartoons are mentioned is once the morning turns into the afternoon, channel 5 here in Los Angeles, plays the Best of Soul Train. Now I want to say that since I have been actually home on the weekends this is purely entertaining to me. Three is nothing like beautiful black men and women in spandex, leg warmers, colorful tanks, and gold chains (and spandex in case you didn't pick it up the first time) dancing to the likes of Rod Stewart and disco classics. It really brings to mind what we think is cool one moment tends to fade within a year or now a days just a few months.

I am constantly entertained by life.

I think it is humorous that KTLA values the importance of Soul Train. Like clockwork every Saturday the dancing divas are video taped for their dancing prowess and Top 20 Hit for the moment. I think it is like a time capsule that we have dug up and found (or placed) cultural significance on the value of the song, the singer, the fashion, the dance moves. I feel like I have performed a few of those steps at the Macomb Performing Arts Center in late Junes for most of my childhood.

I hope and pray that the people who are featured as dancers on Soul Train recount their days on the show and pull out this little factoids at parties or late nights at bars talking to the stranger over their shoulder. This is my hope. If not that there is a copy of the video tape, or BETA, of the moment they were featured, or just in the corner, of the dance floor of Soul Train.