Addenda to Rat-a-tat-tat

1) Context: Four adult siblings (RT and his three sisters) and their sig. o's and kids, matriarch, and patriarch and his sig. o. Middle-of-Nowhere, NY. Two cabins on a lake. 20 degrees Fahrenheit, plus wind chill. Effing freezing for me, "not cold at all" for the Minnesota contingent.

2) If you're a math type, you're going, "Wait. Six guns, seven cousins. Huh?" Why it worked out: Cousin E is a thirteen-year old girl and--as befits a girl of her age and temperament--was wearing inappropriate (for battle, that is) attire. Her micro-miniskirt and high-heeled boots made it unseemly for her to climb the ladders into the lofts, though she was wearing tights. So she got to be Ammo Girl--collected darts that fell short of their targets and returned them to the shooters. One time she forgot herself and climbed too high up the ladder. Her older brother S--who had gotten her that skirt for Christmas, incidentally--shouted, "E! Clothes!" and rolled his eyes and shook his head, "Gahd!" (He's from Minnesota.)

3) Ammo Girl reminds me of J. A few years ago, RT and I went to J's bat mitzvah, where she read the Torah, led the service, and did her parents proud. At the party, she wore a knee-length strapless dress--all grown up. Except that, being only thirteen, she didn't know how to wear that dress and sit on a chair and be lifted above people's heads. Clearly, no one had thought to coach her. It wasn't dreadful, but I don't know how the videographer captured that iconic dance or whatever it is discreetly. Anyway, what a great metaphor for being on the cusp of adulthood.

Ain't no party like a Jedi party...unless you're a girl?

And there was one there. Not only was she the only girl, but she didn't know anyone but TZ and one other boy--and both of them were too battle-crazed to pay much attention to her.

My wonderful "niece", HH, held her own in the "keep the balloon in the air" game, but respectfully declined to run the Jedi training obstacle course, which involved doing battle with Sith baddies on the way out and back. She rode her bike/starfighter through the slalom course in the street, but at the end of the party, as a Sith-Jedi battle raged around her, she sat and patiently worked out a coded message that was supposed to have warned the Jedi of the Sith attack (the Sith were miscued and came out to fight before the code was broken, much to my dismay and the Jedis' delight--they were getting bored with the code and starting to wander off).

I am not sure what her take on the whole thing was. I think she enjoyed herself. The other mothers-of-sons saw her during the final battle, smiled, and said, "They're just different, aren't they?"

On the other hand, once HH was done with the code, she and her sister took up their lightsabers and attacked their daddy with great zeal, so maybe it was just a matter of whom she knew.

Boys and guns and all of that

Clone warrior with awesome blaster (cue TZ panting)

When TZ's mania for guns, war, and other unacceptable problem-solving tools becomes too distressing, I go to good ol' Google and poke around for something that will shed a little light on the issue. What I found this time was a great blog called Blogging 'Bout Boys and an article by Maya Gotz entitled Media and the Make Believe World of Boys and Girls.

The blog, as you might guess, is about boys--parenting boys, to be specific, and according to its author, ain't nothin' you can do 'bout that heat-packin' rapscallion, except to remember that he's also a sweet little boy. Which is the gist of what most Mothers of Older Boys have told me.

I keep thinking, "But you haven't seen my boy in action." Not that he's special, but he kind of is. He's not just interested in something--he's obsessed. It used to be firefighters--anyone else have a son who was a firefighter for Halloween for four years in a row? Granted, the final year (2008) was a transition year--he wanted to be Darth Vader, but I said no, so he went with his backup costume. In 2009, he begged for weeks to be allowed to have a clone trooper costume, and I finally relented.

But back to obsession. For years it was firefighters all day long--except for Rock Star, his other obsession (you play rock star by blasting blink-182 and playing air guitar or pillow drums.) And now it's Star Wars and Clone Wars. All the time. All the time. All...The...Time. Am I making myself quite clear?

Well, okay, sometimes it's United States Marines. With occasional breaks for fart and butt jokes.

TZ plays a hybrid character: part Clone Captain Rex (cool uniform and awesome blaster) and part Anakin (cool hair, mastery of the Force, and awesome light saber); he switches off in terms of which character's role he is actually taking. Combining attributes of power from different characters is typical boy play, according to Maya Gotz, the author of Media and the Make Believe, etc. Boys also tend to lift plots, characters, and setting wholesale from the media source, whereas girls modify their characters, plots, and settings to fit their fantasies. The princesses and fairies end up far more empowered in little-girl fantasy than in the original media. Which is encouraging if you're the mother of a girl, but what about me? I suppose it's nice to know that TZ is typical. Still, living in an imaginary battle zone drives me nuts sometimes.

Harriet the Spy, Disneyfied.

Sigh. Nickelodeon's 1996 movie adaptation of one of my favorite books of all time was passable, with the absurd exception of Rosie O'Donnell as Ole Golly (what?). But Disney's Harriet the Spy: Blog Wars promises to be a travesty. Apparently Jennifer Stone (The Wizards of Waverly Place) spends the movie diving behind couches and wearing silly costumes on her mission to reveal "the biggest teen star"... "for who he really is" (in response to which said teen star cries out, "You don't me! You don't know anything!") so that she can win a blogging competition against "a popular girl". It's just so ludicrous, I don't know whether to laugh or cry. But see for yourself:




What's a Disney movie about a spunky girl without a potential (chaste, of course) hook-up with a hunky guy on the horizon?

The real Harriet would have been a) more sneaky, b) more snarky, and c) less likely to be obsessed with a boy, even as a professional. In addition to its subversive message, the book apparently has a lesbian subtext (Louise Fitzhugh was gay) and a pathos that, oddly enough, haven't made it into any tween movies I've ever seen. Not that I've seen many, but I think I'm on pretty solid ground, here.

I agree that the brainy, independent tomboy is not a huge departure from normal these days, and therefore not as exciting or exotic as she was in 1964. Even Disney's postmodern princesses are portrayed that way, despite their Barbie doll figures, long, luxurious hair, and dreamboat boyfriends. Maybe Disney thinks that the original cagey, prickly Harriet wouldn't appeal to their tween audience--she's certainly not cute or hip, or even nice. But I thought that was the point, and I'd like to think that girls today would get it.

Who knows, maybe the film doesn't end with romance in the wings. Maybe Stone's Harriet is just as much a prickly misfit as the original. I've only seen the trailer, after all, so maybe I'm not giving credit where credit's due.

But I doubt it.

Ms. Fitzhugh must be rolling over in her grave.


Harriet in 1964, 1996, and 2010--the only thing that hasn't changed is the notebook.