It can happen to any parent!

2 Feb 2015

This is a cautionary tale which may break your heart.

I was at a 4 year old’s birthday party at Monkey Mania recently.  No, that’s not the bit that breaks

your heart (though it absolutely destroys your sanity and makes that little part of you that believed you were up for anything shrivel up and die).

For those that haven’t been to one, Monkey Mania is an indoor play centre for children that makes its money by hosting children’s parties hosted by teenagers who fuel themselves on left over fairy bread in the staff room in between leading songs, games and mini discos heavily influenced by the movie Frozen.  They are not all called Monkey Mania but no matter the brand the experience is the same.

Kids love them.

They are hell on earth for anybody over the age of five.

During the ‘disco’ they played Let it go, a couple of other songs and Taylor Swift’s “Shake it off” and I was chatting to the other parents and we were laughing at how many of the dance moves to “Shake it off” the small people knew when one mother made a shocking confession.

Her four year old was obsessed with One Direction.

She begged us to remember that she was a good parent, committed to keeping her children safe but yet she had no explanation for how her daughter came to be exposed to One Direction, let alone become so indoctrinated that they had to play One Direction in the car sometimes.

We none of us judged consciously, not at first, but we all shuffled a little bit away and silently
resolved to tell our children not to play with hers anymore.

It’s a parents greatest shame to find that your child can betray you in a heart beat about a subject so critical to who we are as a person.  Years of hard work ensuring that the great loves of your heart are shielded from the money shredding inanity of terrible boy bands; lovingly exposed to hundreds of tunes that are good for them; taking them to music festivals; limiting their exposure to Justine Clarke’s song “Watermelon”; you name it; YOU HAVE DONE IT.

You understand that you are setting them up FOR LIFE.  This shit is more serious than the breastfeeding vs bottle debate and yet you find the books strangely silent on the topic.

And then BOOM! Someone, somewhere, somehow gets them hooked on One Direction before you know it.

This is not a solo event.  It’s happening to a lot of families. Another example close to us is just over the fence.  Our neighbours are committed heavy metal, hard rock types.  In fact, until they got dogs that shed they never wore anything but black.  But their daughter is such an ardent fan they are actually taking her to see them in concert.

And they have paid real money to do it.  Non ironically.

They know they have sunk to depths they didn’t believe possible and that the shame will stay with them. Her #ozobituary will probably read along the lines of ‘Her first concert was One Direction which undermined all future achievements including developing a cure for cancer’.

And OF COURSE we worry about cross contamination.  Could our daughters’ adoration of this seemingly charming and kindly 7 year old escalate into an addiction we can’t control? Was our pride at avoiding even a temporary Wiggles addiction just a fluke rather than the result of careful, considered parenting?

My husband would lose all faith in the world along with his credibility as a music reviewer and general sense of self as a music geek if one of his daughters became a One Direction fan.

He’d blame me because I know all the words to ‘Paradise by the dashboard lights’ and yet can never remember the name of the song playing when he proposed to me.

So parents, be vigilant.  Know what you are up against.  You can play all the music that is right and good and beautiful but if they’re being peddled One Direction by their peers, you’ll find your innocent children using words like Bieber and Jobro before you know it.

Stay vigilant.  Never let your guard down – particularly around small people who find joy in unicorns,
the colour pink and fairy wings.

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Our fractious relationship with human rights

2 Feb 2015

Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan, two members of the Bali Nine who are on death row in Indonesia, had their hopes for clemency permanently dashed last week.

It’s heartbreaking.

I am absolutely completely against the death penalty.  And I absolutely see and recognise their remorse and their acceptance of a life lived in prison.  I absolutely celebrate what they have managed to achieve in prison.

I don’t profess to understand the intricacies of the case, the oft asked question about whether or not the Australian police could have arrested them here rather than letting them be arrested in Indonesia.  I have never been in a place where trafficking illegal drugs has been a life choice I was in a position to make.

I do understand that when we travel, we travel to experience places as they are, not as they are at home.

And it’s not always pretty.

What I fail to fully understand is why as we, as Australians, are motivated to gather together, hold vigils, perform live, do whatever it takes to protest the laws and humans rights violations of other countries when we turn a blind eye to violations committed by our own government, in our name, that are happening right now.

We protest Greste’s unlawful incarceration but say nothing about our asylum seeker policies which have been named and shamed as plain wrong by the United Nations.  And they affect thousands not just one.

We complain about the rights of native people in other countries being over run by foreign people but ignore the fact that Australia as we know it is a result of a forced occupation and subsequent genocidal approach to the people who already lived here.

We don’t recognise the rights of our own first Australians but can absolutely solve the whole Gaza thing over lunch.

We marched to support Jill Meagher but vote in a body of people who systemically decimate the support systems for women and children living with domestic violence and throw in a healthy dose of victim blaming to boot.

We demand our government hold other government’s accountable but we don’t hold our own government accountable.  And this is not just the current government.  No.

Lately, they’ve all been a bit shit.  Power hungry. Money hungry. Mean.

No government should be above the law.

No government should enshrine the violation of human rights into policy – be it death row or detention centres.

No government should exist in a state of isolation as if there were no lessons to be learned from the past or no future that can be unravelled by poor decision making today.

No government should exist as if a good economy is the only measure of success.

And nobody should vote as if their own well being should be the primary consideration of an elected government.

Our discomfort with confronting our own fractious relationship with human rights is discombobulating because it raises the notion that when we talk about human rights, we are only talking about humans ‘like us’.

But ‘like us’ is a nebulous notion which distorts our basic obligation to humanity.  We can’t just support the rights of some over others because it is easier to criticise ‘others’ than it is to criticise ‘ourselves’.

Basically, if we want Egypt and Indonesia and all the other countries to do the ‘right thing’, we need to be demanding it of ourselves.

And not just at election time. All the time.

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Talking about death with a four year old

30 Jan 2015

I have a four year old which means that I’m becoming adept at discussing things that I quite frankly have no idea about.  I’m also becoming dab hand at deflecting questions with conversations like the following not uncommon:

Her: “What is God?”
Me: “What do you known about theology, religion, philosophy and the like?
Her: “Ummmm….”
Me: “Exactly, we can finish this conversation when you know more about those”

or

Her: “Why do numbers matter?”
Me: “Great question little one, but if I tell you your Year 2 teacher will have nothing to teach you when you get there so let’s leave it for her eh?”

or

Her: “Why aren’t there more girl superheroes?”
Me: (Frantically thinking for good examples and realising that most of the women in superhero stories are villains or scantily clad which segues into a small brain fart about the misogynistic nature of comic books which I hadn’t given much thought to until this very second and which comes out as….) “Great question sweetheart, let’s ask Ms Fallon at school tomorrow”

But the interest in death I take really seriously.  Because death is part of life and while it’s not an easy discussion I believe it’s an important one to have as openly as possible.

“When do you die Mama?”

“When your body gets to the end of it’s life sweetheart”

“When does that happen?

“Odds are when you’re really old, but it’s different for everybody”

“Older than Grandad?”

“Yep”

“Do kids die?”

“Sometimes darling, yes they do”

“When?

“When their body gets to the end of its life”

“And then what?”

“Well everybody gets together and talks about how great you are and how much they loved you.”

“But what about the body? What do you do with the bits that you don’t give to the doctors?”

Yes – we’ve had a conversation about organ donation previously. We describe it as when your body doesn’t need something you can give it to other people who are sick, or to the doctors to learn more about bodies.

This bit about ‘what about the body’ is the bit I’ve found hardest to explain.  So I settled on this after a bit of thought and a few suitably vague answers which didn’t satisfy her in the slightest:

“It depends sweetheart, but the two most common things to do are either bury them in a graveyard or cremate them. What happens then is a bit like what happens to a flower that falls off a tree after it’s finished it’s job being a flower, your body breaks down until it becomes part of the earth again.  Some people like to do that bit slowly so they choose a graveyard and others like to do it quickly so they choose cremation.”

“But what about your dolls?”

“They absolutely go with you.”

And we’ve wandered about a graveyard and looked at gravestones which she found incredibly boring, but which I have always found incredibly restful.  I always think that of all the things that we worry about – the graveyard shows that none of it matters in the end.

And we haven’t had to go into conversations about what cremation is or how you get into a graveyard, she’s okay with the broad concepts and I make it sound no more interesting or scary than talking about how owls smell.

I know that it is a bigger concept but in many ways, to her it is not.  It’s another thought to be explored, another concept that she’s fitting into place inside her brainbox and she pops it in to place between owls and why boys don’t have babies. (She’s sorted that on her own – the hole at the end of a willy is too small)

I don’t say to her things like “don’t worry that won’t happen for a long time” when she asks if I might die or she might die. Because how the hell would I know what life has got in store for any of us? I’m not going make statements which are beyond mine to make. I just reply with something along the lines of “I hope not for a long time darling because we still have a lot of things to get done.”

And she’s okay with this.  I know that the conversations will get harder and more in depth and I’ll have to be googling the shit out of the next level of questions that come up but in the meantime, it makes perfect sense to her that when your body finishes living, that’s dead.

What about you? How do you approach the big questions in your house?

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I got me a new look

29 Jan 2015

Franklophiles

The day has come… Talking Frankly has a new logo thanks to the incredibly talented graphic designer – Jenny Pratt.

This is it.

I WANNA BE A FRANKLOPHILE

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Does your underwear match?

21 Jan 2015

Females of the world – I have a question that I need answered urgently

“Does your underwear match?”

Why do I need it urgently? Because in the early hours of the morning, when I was so wide awake that I was awaker than a very awake thing, I clicked through a series of articles and ended up at some website that said they had PROOF that women who didn’t wear matching underwear WERE DEMONSTRATING THEIR LACK OF CARE FOR THEMSELVES, THEIR FAMILIES AND THE WORLD AROUND THEM.

but they love to get free records

WOMEN THAT DON’T WEAR MATCHING UNDERWEAR are the kind of women that are PERSONALLY RESPONSIBLE FOR EVERYTHING THAT GOES WRONG IN THE WORLD.

So basically, I already feel pretty lousy during the 3am ‘wideawakes’ and then I found out I’m responsible for CLIMATE CHANGE, MISOGYNY, SLAVERY, DAESH, FAMINE, POVERTY, ADDICTION and VELOUR, to name but a few.

I was ashamed.  Because you see – while the idea of wearing matching underwear is perfectly lovely, it stopped being a priority about… oh so long ago I was probably in my twenties. I carelessly and thoughtlessly just buy underwear that is comfortable and fits properly. That said I might choose different coloured bras to work with different coloured tops and dresses but I prefer my underpants the way I prefer my bowties – black.

And until the early hours of this morning I only gave my approach to underwear any thought WHEN I NEEDED NEW UNDERWEAR.

I know. I can hear your gasps of righteous indignation from here.  I have failed women everywhere.

How do I demonstrate my individuality if not by wearing matching underwear in colours that ‘represent the vibrancy of my true self’?

How do I make sure my husband is getting the best from me when I don’t start the day considering what colour underwear will reflect my mood?

How do I explain to my children that the violence visiting the world is because I am one of those women who don’t start the day with my bloomers and bra in cosmic alignment?

No wonder I have made poor life choices since I am one of those women that DON’T CARE ABOUT THEMSELVES ENOUGH TO WEAR MATCHING UNDERWEAR.

I cause the chaos in the world around me by not wearing matching underwear.  And I know also that you need to be TYPING IN CAPITALS TO MAKE A POINT.

So females of the world IS it just me?  Or are there other women out there ALSO RESPONSIBLE FOR THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT?

Anyone? Anyone? Helllooooooooooooo?

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Why the hate little man?

20 Jan 2015

One of the things that perplexes me in life is how people can use the internet to find out incorrect information but completely fail to use that same tool to find correct information.

Another thing that perplexes me is mullet hair cuts.  It’s not business at the front, party at the back, it’s just a very bad haircut which flatters not a single human being ever.

source: www.prettyfknembroidery.com

Yet another perplexity is the amount of time people put into being bigots.  Imagine what they could achieve if they spent half the time and effort hating on somebody doing something else.  Like building lego or pulling weeds out of cemeteries or mindfulness. There really is something out there for everybody.

Last night I was at gathering of volunteers that come together to work out how we can help asylum seekers and refugees settle into their communities.  Actively demonstrate welcome as it were.  It’s not religious or unreligious, it’s not good or bad, it’s not black or white, it’s just a small group of people who in their own small way are living by the hashtag #dontbeadick.

source: www.prettyfknembroidery.com

Some arsehat stood outside the pub we were sitting in with a sign that was offensive.  Mainly because the information on it was incorrect as well as bigoted and the guy holding it had a mullet.  And then he posted a picture of his protest on his Facebook page which was kind of sweet because otherwise we would have remained blissfully aware of his stand against our ‘do gooding’.

But then because I’m a nosy cow I started to trawl through his page (whaaat? His privacy settings are not on obviously) and there are a couple of daft comments by people that don’t know any of us accusing our wee group of merry folk of being crypto christians, faux christians and drinkers.

And muslim lovers.

source: www.prettyfknembroidery.com

1. There is nothing crypto about christianity – that’s the Superman comics. 
2. I never wear fake christians – I’m allergic.
3. That’s true. There’s a lot of merit in the Bacchanalian approach to life.
4. Also true.  If somewhat generalised.  I’m sure there is the odd Muslim I’m not fond of, just as there is the odd Atheist/Humanist/Christian/Hindu/Buddhist/Bacchanalian/Bacon lover of whom I am less than fond.  

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