TeeVeeLand

It was one of those "I don't want to do anything that requires thought" days. Those are the kind of days

as long as they're not divorced!

that cause me to keep a tv in the house. I'm not going to pretend to be one of those people who drapes themselves in the cloak of superiority as they declare "I don't watch television, it's corporate brainwashing" or whatever their reasons are, but as a matter of fact I don't watch a lot of t.v because frankly it is kind of corporate brainwashing. There are days, however, when you just want to tune out and tv is really good for that. When I do watch I tend to choose the classic tv channels, reviewing all the shows I watched as a kid. You know, just in case my brain didn't get sufficiently soaped the first time around.
I prefer watching the same shows that were comforting to me as a kid, which were not necessarily the ones that aired during that era. I realized I mostly watch reruns of reruns, shows that were already in reruns when I was a child. This is especially relevant when it concerns family themed programming. Since my early childhood was spent in the 60's the shows that appeal to me are the ones that aired in the 50's. "Lassie", "Leave it to Beaver" and "Father Knows Best" were among my favorite family themed shows. These kinds of programs have often been criticized for portraying unrealistic images of the modern american family. They sure weren't representative of MY family, but that was part of the appeal. Some shows that aired later in the 60's and into the 70' made an effort to portray a more diverse family structure. The Brady Bunch was a blended family and The Partridge Family was headed by a single mother but those programs featured parents who were widowed, not divorced. In the late 60's having divorced parents singled me out as a minority among my peers and in a nonexistent demographic in T.V. land. One was more likely to have a Witch for a Mother or Martian for an Uncle than to live in a broken home as they were called in those days.  I resented the half assed effort to portray a non traditional family that didn't include the reality of divorce as a cause for the unique structure of that family, it felt like a kind of betrayal and a cowardly one at that.
In the days before "reality tv", an oxymoron if there ever was one, tv was meant to be different that real life. It was there as an escape, a break from reality, a little mental time out. This was before people spent the majority of their day staring at the tube. When kids spent more time playing outside or engaged in other activities like board games or role playing games. I feel like a crabby old lady as I write these words..."back in my day..." but I do believe that peoples relationship with tv was different back then. I was fortunate to have parents who encouraged other activities but also allowed for some indulgence. I learned that tv was a pleasure, like candy, to be consumed in moderation and not as as steady diet. That is why the indulgence of television seemed like it was meant to be sweet, fluff, junk food empty calories, the chocolate cake that June Cleaver presented every afternoon as her golly gee whiz boys burst into the sunny yellow kitchen after a long day of school.
© 2010-2013 Nanakoosa’s Place, authored by Jennifer Hazard