They should really be playing outside anyway.

The problem I have with these longer format stories is that I don’t like the rhythm. The writers are forced to always end with suspense to make sure their viewers come back next week, or next season. It becomes tiresome, and feels more like feeding an addiction than enjoying a story for me. Watching the episodes in chunks after they’ve first aired helps, but the over all rhythm remains unchanged. It’s even worse for shows that break for commercials, because the format requires three little suspense moments every episode. That’s why you can set your watch to an episode of House.

I’d like to see more series that run for one season only– Like Shogun. Tell a story, then stop. Unfortunately, when ratings are high, there is no ‘stop’ for studio execs. That comes when ratings droop, and they force a show to wrap things up. And I can’t think of any examples where that made a show better.

But I’m convinced that a truthful answer is the best; even if it has some short-term ramifications, such as nightmares. Maybe not the whole truth, but at any rate, no fairy tales. Later, when they learn the Tooth Fairy isn’t real, they’ll learn that you are untrustworthy. That’s bad, m’kay?

Okay, enough with the serious. We’ll be back to our usual inanity next week. Sleep tight!

Every parent has a moment when they’re struck by panic and horror– when they realize exactly how fragile their child’s life is, and how futile it is to try protect them from the world. It’s a terrible feeling, as though the ground were suddenly dropping from underneath your feet. It feels as though it’s easy to slip into paranoia, and become “helicopter parents,” trying to shelter your child from every bad thing on this planet. It’s hard to know when to let go– to find the balance between sheltering and smothering.

News media does nothing to help you find that balance. If you take ‘infotainment’ to be a representative sample, then every third person you meet must be a predator just waiting for you to let your guard down, for that split second.

When my daughter was 3 or so, she took a header out our back door, and slid headfirst down a couple of concrete stairs. Right in front of me. She’d walked down these stairs countless times before– but this time she got tangled up by her own feet. I’ve been in a few situations where my own life was at risk (mostly on freeways in Southern California), but never did I feel the kind of cold panic that gripped me as she lost her balance. She was fine, just some scrapes on her chin and lip– a miracle she didn’t bust her teeth out, really.

And that dread was nothing compared to what I felt when she would ask questions about greater horrors–  about what happened to the Indians on this continent when Europeans started setting up shop, or about terrorism. How do you explain that to a young child, in a way that is useful to them and avoids making them feel helpless? Without lying to them? Well, we’ll get to that on Thursday.