Kiddie Porn

This is about kiddie porn, but I am in fact writing about a TV show called 'Toddlers and Tiaras'. It is beyond belief that parents would enter their babies -- yes babies -- in beauty pageants. As if watching a train wreck, I tuned in a while ago and was subjected to a spectacle of blatant child pornography. These babies, toddlers and young children are dressed in sexy outfits, plastered in sparkles and makeup and forced to perform obscene dance routines by their shreiking parents. They are fitted with prosthetic teeth, wigs and false eyelashes to enhance their five-year-old sex appeal. Sick beyond the beyond. Most babies are carried around the stage, completely confused, while exhausted toddlers lurch and stumble through their routines, usually wailing because their mothers are miming threatening gestures from the sidelines. These poor angels are well aware of the consequences of not performing for mummy, as we are taken backstage to witness the threats delivered by the mother and often the father. "You know what will happen if you don't go through your routine. We have discussed this many times Tamara/Samantha/Crystal/Sherry/Bobbie/Kelly (like you can "discuss" something with a one-year-old). You won't be able to get that new bike and mummy won't be able to pay the rent." These parents are doing this for $500 to $1,000. I kid you not. In one pathetic episode, the epilogue described how a featured pre-teen had died just weeks after the pageant, succumbing to cystic fibrosis. Oh yes, and we had just watched her mother pounding on her back so she could breathe just enough to get through the ordeal. She didn't win. What a great little life she must have had. No sports, no ordinary school, no regular friends. Just a sick mother dragging her from one tawdry motel to another.

How is this different from pimping your daughter? Clearly, it is not. One mother had the nerve to tell the camera that if people think it's pornographic, they are the sick ones. This in the face of her three-year-old shaking her "booty" and winking suggestively at the judges. If child pornography is illegal, then baby beauty pageants should be too. What a field day for pedophiles! By the way, most of the judges are men -- wink, wink, nudge, nudge. The mothers actually claim that they aren't forcing their children to do anything, that the babies "just love" performing. What else do these babies know? Most of the mothers are fat slobs and all used to be in pageants themselves -- I guess before they discovered krispy kreams and cheese burgers. Oh well, time to get the babies to take over as I settle into an evening of cokes, chips and icing.

An extension of this took the form of a movie we rented the other day. Called 'The September Issue', it was two hours of life at Vogue Magazine under the dictatorship of Anna Wintour, the barbaric demigod(ess) who edits it. It was scene after scene of homage to mainly hideous fashion hung on emaciated models ordered around by decadent photographers and greedy chain store owners. And all overseen by Anna, the perfect Killer-Bitch-from-Hell. Hidden behind dark sunglasses and popping in and out of chauffered limousines, Anna preys upon the weak and crushes the meek, working her evil day in and day out. To retain power, she kills perfectly good shoots for no apparent reason, flushing $50,000 or so , down the toilet. The beauty editor responsible is crushed, but Anna wins again. Hey, as a veteran of the business publishing industry, I am here to tell you that anyone can be a good editor if money is no object. Don't like that layout? Toss the publisher another. It was refreshing to meet the naturally husband-less Wintour's daughter who, while nonchalantly spooning yogurt, cast asunder the whole "ridiculous" world of fashion; she is studying to be a doctor. Smiling through gritted teeth, her mother was not amused. Don't get me wrong, I like to look good, but devoting every waking minute to whether a scarf should be red or chartreuse I will not do.

Comparing the whole thing to the fabulous women of the Olympics makes the point so many of us have devoted our lives to: raising women to be strong, confident achievers in sports and other healthy endeavours. Here's to our beautiful, wonderful daughters!

High Heels on Ice

Watching the pairs figure skating, that's what it reminded me of -- high heels on ice. The women are so gorgeous, as they glide along all dressed up in sexy, sparkling outfits. They exude confidence and vulnerability simultaneously. Superb athletes and tough as nails in spite of their tiny bodies and delicate moves, they command attention because the strength it takes to do what they do is herculean. Nonetheless, they make it look so easy thanks to partners who support them with such grace.

It brought to mind a recent program that gave me goose bumps every time I watched it: 'Battle of the Blades'. Here were these big, bruising hockey players skating with these beautiful little women and showing more chivalry than most men even contemplate today, let alone carry out as they rush through their day, slamming doors in women's faces. The show was primordial in the primitive instincts it stirred in both sexes. Man, who could easily crush woman, protects and loves her. As Stephane Richer said, "It's a five-minute love affair out there." Right he was. These tough guys had tenderness in their eyes as they gazed on their partners. These gallants were the same brutes who the night before could be found on a hockey rink slamming heads into boards and bashing opponents senseless. Our animal instincts are never far from the surface. In spite of millions of years in human evolution, we only yesterday evolved into australopithecus and stood up from all fours.

The aura surrounding figure skating is the polar opposite to speed skating, where women competing with each other are essentially gender-less. They could be men and are as athletic as any male in any sport. And just as much as I love the gender roles in figure skating, I love the sameness that female speed skaters, hockey players and others compete within alongside their male counterparts in the same sports. It's all good and it's all exciting. The message is that women can be pretty much anything. So why were they prevented from competing in the ski jump? How could that possibly have happened? What a stain on the Olympics.

Mountain climbing in high heels

Man, that's for me. I was facinated by an old movie the other day in which Joan Crawford went mountain climbing in high heels. I kid you not. There she was, perched on a rock, gazing out over a Swiss horizon, resplendent in her makeup, fashionable 'afternoon' outfit, nylons (seams perfectly straight) and high heels. I loved it. She was trying to escape the lover she didn't feel worthy of, but of course he caught up to her and they had a moment. Everything turned out perfectly. Wasn't that always the case in l930's Hollywood.

Made me think of my 2008 visit to daughter Susanne in Vancouver, when we tramped through the gardens at UBC and I had to bail because of my arthritic hips. And I was wearing hideous Adidas shoes! She was not moved by how hard it was for me to walk. But, I can still navigate a cocktail or dinner party in my high heels. I also make it a point to travel in high heels -- kind of a tribute and throw-back to the days of elegant travel, when people actually dressed up to torture themselves in airports, on cruise ships and in train stations.

Hard to believe, but I was quite the athlete in high school. I had to run with the boys to get any competition. Problem was the most athletic girls in high school were relegated to the cheerleading sqaud. Yes, if you could do a cartwheel and jump around, you made the squad. Now I never admit I was a cheerleader, even though the position had a bit of prestige "back in the day". But when I realized I had a daughter with extraordinary athletic ability, I vowed to support her every step of the way in whatever sport in which she excelled. Trouble was, she excelled in everything. Many the morning I jumped into the car at 6 a.m. in my nightgown to drive her wherever she had to go to play waterpolo or run cross country in high school. She became the captain of the women's waterpolo team at Queen's and a world-class triathlete. I remain in awe of my daughter. I am even convinced she could climb mountains in high heels, if challenged.

Where did that little girl go?

I was flipping through a magazine geared to women over forty. I am about 22 years too late for that deal. However, I read a post about a mother who didn't wonder where her daughter had gone, she wondered where that little girl who was always with her, body, mind and spirit, had gone? Yes, that's the question. Where did my own daughter go? For so many years we were as one, but now she is very apart from me. And guess what? That means I succeeded. She is the woman I wanted to raise, a woman who is indepdendent, self-reliant, successful and thriving.

But I still wonder where that little toddler is who raced to the door when I came home from work and held out her hands, big smile on her perfect face, saying, "Up, up, up..." and I picked her up and lived the rest of the evening with her seated on one hip or the other. Afterall, you only need one hand to cook dinner, one hand to draw a bath, one hand to clear a table...one hand for anything else. My Susanne was an extension of me; now she is herself and I am so proud. At times I try to be an extension of her -- a role that never works because I just don't have the talent. At such times, she brings me up short. When we get together, all I see is the adoring toddler, but all she sees is the real, warts-covered me. She lives in Vancouver, thus our encounters are infrequent. Nonetheless, I continue to delude myself that she remains the toddler and I the major object of her devotion. This is not the case and for that I have done my job as a mother.

Happily, I can report that she is getting married to a wonderful man, a man I know is familiar with the toddler. How can anyone marry anyone who has not met the toddler within? With excuses to the "inner child"..............I remain your scribbler.

Church Ladies and making the bed

I have to declare that 'Church Ladies" (CLs) make the world go 'round. By CLs I mean those women who have provided order, routine and standards to the world generation upon generation. These are the women who make breakfast-lunch-and-dinner appear at the correct times. These are the women who have their kids' lunches at the door before the school bus arrives us. These are the women who get the washing and ironing done. These are the women who bake and make aprons for the church bazaar. These are the women who make perfect, crustless tea sandwiches. These are the women who give to charity. These are the women who give tea parties. These are the women who play bridge -- but only if all the household duties have been attended to. These are the women who never gamble. These are the women who stick to a budget. These are true home economists. These are the women who look after their husbands, while ruling the roost. These are the women who rule the world.

This was my mother. This was many of our mothers in the fifties and sixties. I don't know what they thought of us, their daughters who 'morfed into "women's libbers" -- surprised at how it all didn't quite work out. I know they were absolutely mortified and horrified at how superior we fancied ourselves. Who can blame them? They never sold out and recoiled when we bragged about our careers. We, their daughters, sold out. We were the braless crazies who forfeited our power as women. We were the women who tried to be men. We failed. And what did we gain? Disdain.

All this runs through my mind every day as I make the bed -- a favourite duty (not a chore) I have thankfully been carrying out for 59 years. My mother taught me how to make a bed when I was three. I have not forgotten. Whenever things seem to be going array, admiring a made bed banishes chaos immediately. Order overtakes, followed by calm. The same can be said for fresh laundry, ironing and the smell of clothes dried on an outdoor line. Self indulgence has no place in the life of a Church Lady. Self discipline is the watchword. Feelings are kept to oneself, politesse rules, form takes precedence over everything and children become the centre of an ordered universe. Children know that whatever happens, bath-time and bed-time will supersede all else; both will follow a nutritous dinner and be on time. This has always been the credo of the Church Lady. I still try to adhere.