Logically, I know I'm accomplishing a lot but all I can think of is the next task. It's hard to be present during leisure times and it's hard to not be thinking of the next thing that has to be done, the next hurdle to be jumped.
Right now my eldest Tiny Charge (a whole three years old!) is into Everything Disney. Her consumption is carefully regulated but she loves all the music. "Let It Go" is her nap protest song, we listen to the Frozen Pandora station in the car. All of the big Princess "Finding Yourself" songs play in rapid success on our way from play school to the park.
What's a fire and why does it - what's the word?/ Burn!/ When's it my turn?/ Wouldn't I love, love to explore that world up above?
There must be more than this provincial life!
Who is that girl, I see staring straight back at me/ Why is my reflection someone I don't know?/ Somehow I cannot hide who I am, though I've tried/ When will my reflection show who I am inside?/ when will my reflection show who I am inside?
Here I stand/ And here I'll stay/ Let the storm rage on/ My power flurries through the air into the ground/ My soul is spiraling in frozen fractals all around/ And one thought crystallizes like an icy blast /I’m never going back,/ The past is in the past/ Let it go, let it go/ And I'll rise like the break of dawn/ Let it go, let it go/ That perfect girl is gone
It's kind of a lot having your midlife existential crisis being summed up into bite sized pieces meant to be consumed by would-be toddlers pretend princesses. But they won't be princess at all, even though we live in an oligarchy which makes me afraid to think how that's going to work out for Gen Z because . . .I don't know about you, but 65% of their jobs depend on ethereal "jobs that don't yet exist" seems a bit terrifying.
When it's not Frozen in Toddler Pretend Princessville, it's Tangled. And I know Frozen is problematic on a lot of levels, but what really aggravates me is the Disney take on Rapunzel. In the original version, it seems pretty clear cut that the woman raising Rapunzel isn't a particularly kind woman and what Medieval Era babe doesn't want to get the fuck out of dodge to bear a million of some random's babies? I mean, options were limited to say the least and you were probably going to die of plague if not childbed. Okay, fine.
But have you seen the end of Tangled? Basically, in a nutshell, Rapunzel figured out that the King and Queen were her real parents, Mother Gothel tries to kill the dude who Rapunzel knew for all of three days so Rapunzel decides allow her mother to be thrown out a window and to give the last bit of her magic to the random boy to heal him and to live happily ever after with two people she's never before met.