caraig | Rambling. Sorry.

This will be kind of rambly. Lot of thoughts colliding in my head like a particle accellerator, with lots of little things coming out of it as well as a lot of undirectable energy. Trust me, I can't direct that energy.
Mom's condition today worsened... I guess. She had shortness of breath earlier today which, in the language of doctors, means moving her out of rehab and into the medical unit with an oxygen mask. She's... not delirious, but dazed. Responsive, but not active. Probably wants like hell to get out of the hospital, but... we can't, not yet.

And she's going to be snowed in there Sunday.

And ever day I come home from the hospital and it feels like a Dad-shaped vacuum is beside me in the car. But... more on that later. Someday. Maybe. Much more.

So I'm going to free-assosciate think here. Some things that pop into my mind like motes wandering into a moonbeam of light.

I hate Hot Pockets. There was a time when those were my lunch, then I cut back, then I had them off and on again while mom was in the hospital. Then I realized just how awful they are. Not even from a taste standpoint. They suddenly took on the appearance to me of everything wrong with corporate consumerism. Ooh, big words. Okay, let me explain that. A Hot Pocket is a piece of pseudo-synthetic pastry folded over and filled with more pseudo-synthetic stuff, like processed meats and over-processed cheese and mostly-chemical sauces. Doesn't sound too appetizing, does it? They're kind of tasty in a desperate sort of way, at least certain ones are. But they're billed as 'meals.' To wit, meals for 'when you don't have time to eat.' And they're probably maddeningly fattening, even then 'Lean Pockets.'

This struck me as vaguely disturbing. The impression is that if you're so busy with your life that you can't eat a regular, healthy meal, you pop one or two of these in the microwave and that'll do. These aren't meals, they're not even a PART of regular meals. They're so synthetic they probably have a gram of actual organic amino acids in them. What's worse is that the 'Lean Pockets' junk is being billed as being 'healthy.' I've eaten Lean Pockets. They don't TASTE healthy, at all. So the corporatism comes in because Chef america is getting away with foisting this stuff on the consumer and.. really, Hot Pockets might make a halfway decent fill-me-up if you're hungry but I wouldn't fill out a menu with them. Healthy? My ass, they're healthy.

Likewise in the area of corporatism making a mockery of things, this next item really and truly bothers the HELL out of me, even more than the Hot Pockets thing. Any of you ever see the line of toys called Bratz? I first ran into them while looking for some Lego for my nephew in Toys-R-Us and was further assaulted by them from a few balloons hanging in the bakery. Bratz is, basically, an early-21st-Century Barbie, but I think a better name for the line would be 'Trampz.' Seriously, looking at the characters made me think of nothing less than Brittney Spears and Paris Hilton -- and I NEVER mention Paris Hilton in a 'good way.' Toothpick-thin, collagen lips, obsession with 'The Mall....'

Normally I'm pretty much in favor of a more liberal society than we currently have. I think that Western Society is generally unhealthily stringent and puritan. We need more relaxed attitudes towards a great many things -- more on this later. At the same time, there is the 'other extreme' which has given us (as MTV puts it) the 'Mook' and the 'Midriff.' The 'Midriff' being the image of the jaded, libidinous, appearance-hyperconscious, objectified-and-loving-it female. This is the female image portrayed most often in mass media. 'Girls Gone Wild On Spring Break,' and such, which gives the impression that, yes, girls JUST LIKE THIS are doing things JUST LIKE THIS! Ironically, and unsurprisingly, the 'Moral Majority' is completely against this as well; can't say I agree with everything they have to say, but at least there's some synchronicity here.

Anyway, Bratz makes me twitch and cringe and makes me want to take a flamethrower to that whole aisle. Then you turn around and see the exact same thing -- on the cover of Mademoiselle and Vogue and other such rags. Really, we do NOT want to raise the girls of the next generations that to be attractive they need to dress like tramps and be nail-thin and portray one's self as libidinous. I'm pretty liberal, I think; I believe human sexuality to be a GOOD thing, a HEALTHY thing, and the stringent suppression of it is a harmful thing. However, the objectification of females and the marketed image of the 'ideal woman' as the 'Midriff' is doing significant damage to the psyche of at least half the population of Western civilization, and likely damage to the other half as well. There's nothing wrong with sexuality, it's a part of who we are; ultimately, it baffles and bothers me why graphic violence is perfectly fine in the media -- both fictionalized and in the news -- while graphic nudity and sex is shunned. It's arguably better to boink than kill, so why the weird juxtaposition?

In a vaguely similar vein, I'm starting to develop the belief that the so-caled 'nuclear family' has failed. The whole nuclear family concept has been touted as the ideal for modern living system, judged to give sufficient emotional support for the entire family. Bullshit. That might work if everyone in the 'nuclear family' is reasonably emotionally healthy. But how many families these days are truly like that? If it was just me and Dad through this, I would have defenestrated myself long ago because the emotional support from him simply is not there (arguably understandably so, but that's the subject for another rant which will not be forthcoming for some time.) No, the extended family -- what part of it is still around -- has helped me to keep sane, as well, but the concept of the 'nuclear family' is that it's nuclear, it doesn't need support. Kick the fledglings out of the nest when they're grown, come-what-may. Somehow, the logic of the nuclear family giving all necessary emotional support escapes me.

Kibbutzim and other extended family systems have their failings, this is true. However, the veracity of the negative aspects of the kibbutz is in doubt, and besides which they were organized for very specific, agricultural and military-political reasons. What of those formed in societies where there is no such external values placed upon them or effected upon them, in which the extended family or clan has been the basis of society for centuries?

I'm running out of steam here. It's been an emotional day, and I should sleep at some point tonight. That was a lot of rambling. I feel kinda better now, as it is. Anyway, as always feel free to comment, agree or disagree or pick apart or shred into little bits or whatnot.

Pax.