Essay #20: Monsters

I've been reading Claire Dederer's Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma for a couple of weeks. Dederer, a professional film and book critic as well as a memoirist, writes about one of the big questions facing fans right now: can I enjoy art created by a person who has done terrible things?

Her book is an engaging and nuanced approach to the complicated question, and she addresses many of the expected figures in this discussion (e.g. Woody Allen, Roman Polanski, Michael Jackson, Pablo Picasso). Of course, as Dederer repeatedly points out, these figures are almost exclusively men.

The chapter I read last night, however, is about female monsters. Dederer argues that, from a societal perspective, male monsters are defined as such because they prey on women and children. Female monsters are defined as such because they abandon children, abdicating their duties as mothers.

Dederer argues that being an artist is orthogonal to being a mother, for both practical reasons (artistry requires free time that motherhood consumes) and psychological (artistry requires selfishness that motherhood precludes). Historically, male artists have prioritized their art over fatherhood in a way that is approved, or at least accepted, by the broader culture. Women who do the same, however, are despised for abandoning their caretaking role.

It's a point I've thought of a lot since watching Lost Daughter, an adaptation of an Elena Ferrante novel, and then reading the novel itself. In the Ferrante story, the reader learns the protagonist, Leda, abandoned her young daughters, leaving them with her husband, for several years to pursue her academic career (and, to be fair, to have an affair with an admiring peer). As an older woman, Leda struggles to come to terms with her actions and with her relationship to her children, feeling she is an "unnatural mother."

Of all the stories I've seen about motherhood, Lost Daughter hit me especially hard. I identified so strongly with the suffocating experience of motherhood, particularly in the years when my girls were very young. If I'm being honest, I also identified with the desire to disappear, to leave it all behind and feel untethered. I remember wryly telling a friend that I was lucky I'm not in a career where my intelligence or ambition are rewarded, or where I have the potential to "rise to the top"--I have no justification for an action like Leda's. 

My friend looked at me in surprise, and I felt a little embarrassed. I don't think he could understand just how paradoxical motherhood can be. Of course I love my children; I'm grateful to be their mother. I believe I'm a better person today because of them. I would never abandon them. But that doesn't mean the desire to cut it all loose doesn't exist sometimes.

Fittingly enough, I was pulled away from this essay after the paragraph before--to move the laundry into the dryer and to start a new load; to console Clara, who was angry Amelia had thrown her Shopkin; to make both girls grilled cheese for lunch. They're now eating quietly in the kitchen, while I steal back into my office to finish this essay. An essay that no one will read, that has no real exigence or purpose, that I care about anyway. 

For that reason, I appreciate Dederer taking on Ferrante's themes from a critical perspective, and from the perspective of an artist and a mother who's grappled with similar issues. It gave me a sense that maybe I'm not a "monster," or an "unnatural mother," as Leda feared. I can love my children and want to be more than a mother.

Essay #19: Reflection

Three years ago, I switched to a "gradeless" classroom. Instead of grading individual assignments, I provide narrative feedback on students' work, and at the end of each quarter, they write me a letter arguing what grade they've earned in the course, in line with how well they've worked towards our classroom goals.

As part of that letter, students have to reflect on their work over the last nine weeks: what's gone well and where they still need to improve. Pedagogically speaking, I think it's an important that students be able to articulate what they know and what they don't. Equally importantly, they need to have some sense of what needs to change to achieve mastery.

Today my AP students had to turn in their quarter letters. As with every year, not all students are as sincere in the process as others. Occasionally I find myself rolling my eyes as a student gushes about how much his writing has improved--while ignoring obvious weaknesses. Others describe real progress, but in generic terms that don't reflect much understanding of the skills they're using. Some admit they're struggling but don't really know why.  However, a lot of the letters impress me. They reflect a level of metacognition about the work the students are doing that gives me hope. Not just hope for their work in my class or their chance on the AP exam, but hope that their ability to self-reflect can create meaningful change in themselves and in their worlds.

In the letters, the students also often say some nice things about my class. Again, I know it's not all sincere--who's going to bad-mouth a class and then say he deserves an A?--but even when I'm feeling most cynical, I don't think it's all empty flattery. Plus, hearing what's worked helps me reflect too. And hope that I'm creating some kind of meaningful change, even if it's just in my little classroom. 

Essay #18: Subtitles and Glasses

Jeremy and I have spent the last two nights watching Scrapper, a recent British movie about a rebellious twelve-year-old who must forge a relationship with her absent father after her mother's death. Even though it's in English, we're watching it with subtitles, as we do most movies these days. There's a lot of reasons we need the subtitles: the challenges of the British accents and British slang; the construction of modern flat-screen TVs, which produces poorer-quality sound; the ambient noise in my house from heaters and other appliances. 

I'm also watching the movie wearing my glasses. I got a prescription for them this year, and though they're sort of cute, I never wear them out and about--only to watch movies in my home. Wearing them is like suddenly having an extra-high-definition TV. The images are clear and crisp. Plus I can read the subtitles.

At times, resorting to subtitles and glasses seems a little extreme. I'm only forty! But I have to admit that a better film experiences trumps my vanity. I know I'm lucky, too: streaming and easy availability of DVDs means that I can have subtitles for anything I want; low-cost eyeglasses shops like Zenni make frames a cheap purchase. Ten or fifteen years ago I would have resorted to turning up the sound and squinting. I try not to be too appreciative of tech, especially for things like entertainment, but this is one for which I'm grateful.

Essay #17: Kitchen Table

I have a distinct memory of when Jeremy and I purchased our current kitchen table. We'd been using an Ikea table that I acquired right out of college for twelve years, and it was clear we needed to upgrade. Not only was its wood veneer cracking badly, but it was far too small, even when extended, to fit all the people we had for our regular Dungeons & Dragons gatherings. Jeremy and I went with the girls to a local, real wood furniture store to find a piece that would look good, fit a crowd, and last. Amelia was three at the time, and Clara was a baby, maybe a few months old. By some stroke of bad luck, we'd forgotten to bring the diaper bag. By a double stroke of bad luck, Clara pooped.

Our precarious situation put us at a crossroads. Should we abandon the table purchase, return home, and then trek two small children out, yet again, to pick the perfect table? Or should we make a decisive judgment? We chose to be decisive. (It didn't help much--then came chair choice and stain choice and leg style choice. Fortunately Clara didn't seem to care too much.)

Still, I was pleased with our table purchase. It was the first piece of "real" furniture Jeremy and I purchased together. It was a rich, dark brown wood. In its smaller form, it was the perfect size for a family of four; fully extended, it easily fit our D&D group.

Our family loved that table, but in the suffocating-the-cat-by-laying-on-it way, not the loving care kind of way. From the beginning, our girls ate the same food as us, not baby food, and they ate it from the table, not a high chair. We tried to keep the table somewhat protected, but we unwisely used thick plastic placemats and rubber meal mats, which trapped moisture underneath. Within a short period of time, the finish at the girls' two ends of the table had rubbed away. As the years passed, the table became sticky-feeling, its finish gone.

A year ago I tried to repair some of the damage, but only succeeded in giving the table a weirdly-shiny sheen that did nothing to cover the worn and sticky areas. So, a couple months ago, I made another decisive decision: I'd get it refinished. A local craftsman agreed to take on the job. He picked the table up in early December and returned it a week later, this past Monday evening.

It's beautiful. It looks brand new! The top is smooth and gleams mildly. It makes me happy looking at it.

A few people asked me why we didn't just buy a new table. We spent $700 on the refinishing, which was cheaper than the original table but certainly not a small amount of money. But I'd never considered getting rid of it. It's our table. I'm proud of it. It was with us through the throes of toddlerdom. It's hosted D&D, game nights, gingerbread-house parties, Thanksgiving during Covid, and dinners with family friends. It survived a 250-pound man falling through the ceiling and landing on it! (that's another story) And, now, it even looks good too.

Essay #16: Christmas Lights

My dad has put up Christmas lights for as long as I can remember: fat, multi-colored bulbs strung along the roof of our house. Even though white lights, icicle lights, and others have come into fashion since my childhood, he's continued to use the same style for decades.

When I was younger, it was an annual tradition for my parents to drive my siblings and me around the neighborhoods admiring other families' Christmas displays. In college, I had a friend, John, who was a Christmas fanatic. For years, we'd get together after the Christmas Eve church service to traverse the neighborhoods, offering live commentary and deciding which house had the best showing. I became attached to houses with oversized colored bulbs. One year, John got $5 gift cards to City BBQ, and we left them in the mailboxes of the houses we judged the winners. 

This past Sunday night we visited family friends to partake in their neighborhood's annual tradition. Houses in the neighborhood light luminaries, and the neighbors gather for a December walk. There was even a food truck that served donuts and hot chocolate. It was a cold evening after so much warm weather, so it wasn't too surprising that we saw a lot of people at the food truck--and almost no one enjoying the lights.

Still, the eight of us walked a few blocks to the most impressive display in their neighborhood--one of those computer-choreographed shows set to music. We hung out on the sidewalk, admiring the pulsating lights. The kids danced (okay, I did too). The homeowner walked out to offer us candy canes. It was a gift-card deserving performance, for sure.

Despite my admiration for other people's lights, I've never put them up myself, even though my children have asked. I'm willing to put a lot of energy into traditions I care about, but electronics feel too much. A wreath on the front door is all I manage for external Christmas decorations. Maybe that's why I'll be all the more glad to see my dad's colorful lights when we drive home for Christmas in a few weeks.

Essay #15: Doctor Who

I came upon this line from Donald Hall in John Green's Anthropocene Reviewed: "We did not spend our days gazing into each other's eyes. We did that gazing when we made love or when one of us was in trouble, but most of the time our gazes met and entwined as they looked at a third thing. Third things are essential to marriages, objects or practices or habits or arts or institutions or games or human beings that provide a site of joint rapture or contentment. Each member of a couple is separate; the two come together in double attention.”

For many years, Jeremy and my "third thing" was Doctor Who.

I couldn't say exactly why we both embraced this niche fandom. I'd fallen deeply for The X-Files in middle school, and Jeremy adored the high-fantasy Wheel of Time series as a kid, so maybe it somehow fit both interests. The new series' reboot started in 2005, but I believe we jumped on board a couple years later. In 2013, when we traveled to Great Britain, we visited Cardiff, Wales solely because it's where Doctor Who is filmed. We did a bus tour of shooting locations and spent hours in the Doctor Who Experience, a sort of interactive museum. 

It's a little funny that we visited in 2013, because the next year I would give birth to Amelia, and she would shift to be our one and only "third thing" (until Clara was born in 2017, of course). Doctor Who had declined in quality by then anyway, we said. There were huge gaps between seasons. We still kept up with the show, though often months after the episodes aired. We thought Jodi Whittaker did an admirable job, but we couldn't muster any enthusiasm for her tenure.

Within the last few weeks, Doctor Who aired three new specials starring David Tennant and Catherine Tate. David Tennant previously played the Doctor from 2005-2010, when we first started watching, and Tate joined him as his companion Donna Noble in 2008. At first I was a little skeptical--the choice to bring back old stars seemed like a desperate cash-in on nostalgia, and the first special was clunky and thematically awkward.

This past Friday night, Jeremy and I watched the second special, and it was like I'd been transported back in time. The story was interesting; the characters had chemistry; the pace was quick; the villains were scary. It was an hour of pure joy. For an hour, we shared our former "third thing." I remembered life before children, where being passionate about something inconsequential seemed important, not a silly luxury. I remembered the enthusiasm for complicated adventures and weird British mannerisms that had brought Jeremy and I together.

Of course, Doctor Who had never been our only "third thing." There was The Office; our cats, Abby and Oliver; a cooking class; a dislike of Philadelphia; Scrabble games. Still, it stands out to me as uniquely emblematic of my 20's and the first years of our marriage.

Today, there are still remnants of our Doctor Who stage around the house, including a Tardis salt shaker and coin bank and a poster of the Doctors in our bathroom. And if you're a fan like us, then you'll already have noticed another remnant: the names of our children.*

*Amelia Pond, companion from 2010-2012 (The Doctor played by Matt Smith)
Clara Oswald, companion from 2012-2015 (The Doctor played by Matt Smith and then Peter Capaldi)

Essay #14: Rainy Weather

Yesterday's evening forecast called for continuous heavy thunderstorms. Still, we decided to press our luck and visit the Cincinnati Zoo for its annual Festival of Lights. We prepared appropriately: waterproof boots, rain jackets, and three umbrellas. We also got there very early--at 3:30pm. We had the zoo nearly to ourselves the first hour and were second in line to visit Santa and Mrs. Claus. We were the first to purchase fried elephant ears--covered in caramel, chocolate chips, and whipped cream--from "Mrs. Claus' Workshop." The girls had no trouble reaching the handlers to pet the snakes. The crowds had picked up some by the time we left at 6:30, the lights beautiful against the night sky, but it never felt packed. The price we'd paid for a calm, warm evening at the zoo in December? Walking through some drizzle.

At this point, Jeremy and I take it as a point of pride that we're willing to gamble on rain for the sake of avoiding crowds. Perhaps our biggest win was during our vacation to Gatlinburg in the summer of 2022. We'd scheduled Saturday as our hiking day in the Great Smoky Mountains, but it poured all Friday night, and when we woke up, we were dismayed to see the day's forecast called for constant thunderstorms. We checked the radar repeatedly, and by the time we'd had breakfast and gotten dressed, the forecast showed a small break in the storms for the next hour or two. "Let's go for it," Jer said. We piled the girls in the car, grabbing our rain jackets, and headed out.

We'd chosen to attempt some of the park's most popular trails, including Chimney Tops, which I'm sure would have normally been overrun on a weekend during peak tourist season. Instead, we found ourselves hiking alone, enjoying the new water features created by the previous night's rainfall. The girls managed nine miles over three trails that day. The trails were wet, but it never rained.

This past summer, Jeremy and I vacationed in Scotland and spent three days hiking the West Highland Way. Of course, since it's Scotland, it rained every day, and since we had no wiggle room in our itinerary, that meant wet hiking. And, for the most part, I found I didn't really mind. The moors only seem right in a foggy mist.

To be sure, we've had a couple of our risks fail. There comes a point where rain is so intense that any kind of outside activity isn't really possible. But I like to remind myself that none of us are Wicked Witches, and we've nothing to fear from the rain.