You and Your Family

Today’s Saturday Short is “You and Your Family,” part of the Art of Living Series. It’s a multiple choice quiz about You and Your Family.

Your Family is gathered in the living room. The phone rings. Mary answers. It’s her boyfriend and he wants to know if she can come to a dance at the lake tomorrow night? Mary runs back into the other room to ask her parents for permission. Mom says no and Dad goes along with her.

The narrator pipes up. Has anything like this happened in your home? How would you react? What do you think Mary should do next? Mary acts out some vignettes of different reactions.

A) She goes back to the phone. Her parents said no, she says. I guess our date’s off. She hangs up and goes into a powerful sulk.

B) After Dad tells Mary no, she has an idea. Why doesn’t she have her own party at the house tomorrow night? They could play music and make sandwiches and dance! Dad thinks this is a great idea. Mary rushes back to the phone to tell her boyfriend of the new plan.

C) Mary starts whining when Dad says no. She goes into a full-blown tantrum and storms out of the room. Mom follows her out to give her a good talking-to.

D) Mary goes back to the phone. She quietly tells her boyfriend that her parents said no, but she’ll sneak out of the house tomorrow night and meet him anyway.

Did Mary do right in Scene 1, 2, 3, or 4? Why?

No and because. Next question!

Your Family is gathered around the table finishing supper. Mom asks who’s going to help her do the dishes tonight.

MARY would like to but she has so much homework she has to run very fast to get it all done.

What about you FATHER? “I should say not,” he says in the tone of a man who’s going to find himself sleeping on the couch tonight. Er, that is, he has to read the paper. Lots of stuff going on in the world. Yes siree bobbaroonie. Gotta keep up with those current events and all. Let Bill do it.

BILL pops up from his chair like he has a spring in his butt. Some of the fellas are waiting for him, he says as he disappears in a cloud of dust.

GEORGE will help. And, in his opinion, if CERTAIN OTHER people would help out once in a while the work would get done that much quicker!

Whose answer was best, MARY, BILL, FATHER, or GEORGE? Or maybe an entirely different answer, perhaps one that isn’t filled without so much whining?

It’s 12:45. Bill is sneaking back into the house because he was supposed to be home at 11:00. He walks to the stairs, deliberately not looking where he’s going so he’ll crash into the phone table and knock it over. A light comes on upstairs. Uh-oh, Father is up. What should Bill do now?

A) Father asks, “What kept ya, Son?” “It was like this,” Bill says making up an excuse on the spot. He’s terrible at lying and can’t keep his own story straight from one end of a sentence to another. “Are you sure you’re telling the truth,” Father asks. Of course Bill is! The trouble with this family is that no one believes his obvious lies!

B) Father asks, “Where were ya, Bill?” Nunya business, Bill snaps. He’s not a kid anymore. He can take care of himself! And from now on that’s just what he’s going to do. He storms out of the house. The next morning the milkman finds him curled up on the front stoop.

C) Father asks, “What kept ya, Bill?” “Sorry Dad,” Bill says. He was hanging out with The Guys and lost track of time. Dad asks if Bill knows the punishment coming to him. He can’t go out again for a week, Bill replies. It’s okay, it was my fault. He goes upstairs with Dad.

It seems to me the answer to this question depends on how Dad asks Bill why he was late.

Time for a review! What should happen when an invitation is received by telephone or otherwise? What is a good course of action when it’s time to do housework? What procedure do you recommend when someone comes home late?

Back in the living room, George turns to the camera to speak directly to us. What do you have to say about these family problems, he asks. I have to say they’re overly simplistic and geared towards an ideal version of white middle-class life in the late 1940s created by advertisers and educators trying to get people to forget the brief freedoms non-white non-men enjoyed during WWII. But that’s just me.

A Date with Your Family

Today’s Saturday Short is “A Date with Your Family,” part of the Conformity Series. It’s about how to use a family dinner to reinforce 1950s WASP-y norms.

A teenage boy and girl come home from school. They chat as they drop their books and coats all over the kitchen table. The narrator tells us “they’re looking forward to an important date: dinner at home with the family.” While Brother and Daughter inspect the oven and stove, the narrator chides us for not thinking that a family meal is not the most important part of the day. Brother steals a walnut off the cake on the table before he and Daughter gather up their junk and go up to their rooms.

Cut to the dining room. Daughter is setting the table. The narrator points out that she’s changed her clothes. “Dressing a little,” he says, “makes her feel, and consequently look, more charming.” In the den Mother is knitting. The narrator also comments on her outfit. “The women of this family feel they owe it to the men of the family to look relaxed, rested, and attractive at dinner time.” Oh boy. Here we go.

Brother is in his room doing his homework. The phone rings. He answers it and wanders around the house, stretching out the cord, as he talks. Daughter can’t do her homework because she has to summon Mother to the kitchen for the finishing touches on dinner. They have to make sure the Hell has been thoroughly boiled out of the vegetables so they’ll be fit for a Christian table.

Upstairs, Brother finishes his homework just as Junior rushes in, filthy from his baseball game. Brother is teaching Junior how to conform to white middle-class standards, so he herds him into the bathroom to clean up.

While Mother and Daughter finish up the salad, Father comes home. He looks worn out and not at all like he’s looking forward to dating his family tonight. He braces himself for interacting with his children before he goes into the den.

Meanwhile Daughter is fussing with a huge bowl of flowers that takes up the whole table. She moves it to the sideboard. This will be important later.

Brother and Junior come into the den. “They greet their dad as if they are genuinely glad to see him,” says the narrator, briefly lifting the curtain on the true family dynamic. Father holds up his end of the charade by feigning interest in what his sons have been doing. They have a pleasant discussion about pleasant topics. Postpone difficult discussions for a later time, like after Father is moldering comfortably in his grave.

Mother comes in to announce dinner is ready. The boys run into the dining room while their parents shake hands like they’ve just met. Daughter is still fussing with the flowers until Father pulls her away for her part in the elaborate seating sequence. Now let us pray. Rub-a-dub-dub, thanks for the grub, yay God.

Father begins serving. Looks like they’re having ham, mashed potatoes, and peas. Wait, where’s the salad Daughter was working on? Is it on the sideboard behind the flowers? Brother helps Junior cut his ham, which has turned into a strip of leathery steak. They wait for Father to serve himself and Mother to start eating before they all can eat as well.

“Pleasant, unemotional conversation helps digestion,” the narrator assures us. This is why Mother and Father lead the conversation. “They made all of this possible and they want to talk over their day with each other” while ignoring their three children.

Please note that Brother is wearing his pointiest collar to dinner. Be sure you don’t put out Junior’s eye with that shirt, Brother. That would not be pleasant.

Speaking of not being pleasant, the family will now demonstrate other ways to unintentionally bring emotion to the table:

1. Don’t monopolize the conversation. Daughter demonstrates this one because girls be talkin’, am I right? This is wrong because it makes the Men of the Family look bored.
2. Don’t discuss unpleasant topics. Brother and Junior use modern dance to act out a fight on the schoolyard. Father looks annoyed.
3. Don’t make unkind comparisons about your standard of living. Daughter demonstrates this one again by pointing out various parts of her dress. Father is even more annoyed and looks like he regrets his entire life up to this moment.
4. Don’t insult your brother or sister with offensive remarks about friends. (So making offensive remarks about them personally is okay?) Brother and Daughter join in this demonstration by having an argument. Father yells at them until pleasantness returns and everyone is hiding their emotions under a thick blanket of unemotional conformity.

Time for dessert! “Most families don’t have maids,” the narrator reminds us, because most of the domestics found other jobs after two world wars destroyed the Victorian/Edwardian caste system. Brother and Daughter carry the dirty dishes into the kitchen and cut the cake. They bring in the slices for the conclusion of what the narrator assures us was a thoroughly pleasant meal.

“Do you see how a date with your family can be a truly special occasion?” the narrator asks. “When the dinner hour at home is treated with a certain amount of graciousness and ceremony, it can be memorable.” Those memories can later be recounted to a therapist who will help you work through your issues. Those issues will be responsible for that same therapist to be able to pay off their mortgage. It’s the gift that keeps on giving!

Good night everyone, and remember to always be pleasant.

The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath

5 stars

First Sentence: It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York.

Thoughts: If this book speaks to you, it may be time to refill your antidepressants. Just sayin’. I just got my refill so I was good to read The Bell Jar again.

Esther Greenwood won a trip to New York City and a temp job at a Major Magazine in a nationwide writing contest. She joins eleven other college girls from around the country for a glamorous month in the Big City. Esther has no idea how she ended up with all these sophisticated young women. The closest thing she has to a friend in the group is Doreen, a party girl debutante from Down South who uses Esther as her winggirl as she goes to parties picking up guys. Eventually Esther gets tired of it and stops tagging along so much.

Work isn’t much better. She’s equally intimidated by and professionally attracted to CJ, the editor she’s working with. CJ sees potential in Esther, but she’s not so sure. How could she possibly compete with all the sophisticated people around her?

Then the trip ends and Esther comes home. She finds a letter on the kitchen table saying she didn’t get into the writing course she applied to. She doesn’t want to take another summer class, so she stays home with her mother for the summer. She slides deeper and deeper into depression until her mother finally takes her to a (male) psychiatrist. Esther’s not better after three sessions, so the psychiatrist decides to try electroshock therapy. It goes badly and Esther swears off medical help.

Eventually Esther climbs into a hole in the cellar with a bottle of sleeping pills. Fortunately someone finds her before she stops breathing. When she wakes up, she’s in the city hospital psych ward. It’s a miserable experience. Fortunately the woman who sponsored Esther’s college scholarship steps in and has her transferred to a private hospital which is much better. There Esther gets a new (female) psychiatrist and decent (for the 1950s) care. She finds one of her old college buddies, Joan, in the hospital as well. They strike up an uneasy friendship through the ups and downs of their care until it all ends abruptly.

This is a terrifyingly accurate portrayal of what it’s like to live with depression. It all seems so normal because we’re looking at it from Esther’s point of view. Of course everyone is better than her, she’s trapped under a bell jar running out of oxygen. Of course she can never measure up, they’re getting enough oxygen. Of course everything is stupid and there’s no way out, she can’t lift the jar up from underneath.

One thing I really like about the book is that we never get a lot of details about why Esther’s depressed, just hints here and there. The reasons aren’t important, lifting up the jar of depression is. We can save the deep analysis for later once the crisis has passed. Or maybe never. The thing is to get that jar up a few inches to let the fresh air in so Esther can recover. Well, maybe recover’s not the right word. I don’t think depression’s something you can “recover” from. You can manage it, maybe go into remission, but the jar will always be there overhead. That’s cheerful, isn’t it? Sometimes you have to redefine your terms depending on what the context is.

Appreciating Our Parents

Today’s Saturday Short is “Appreciating Our Parents,” sponsored by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It’s your typical 1950s perfect family propaganda.

Meet Tommy. He’s sitting in his bedroom staring in horror at the awful wallpaper. It’s really bad. The first few frames of the film fled in terror from it. (Alliteration!) No, wait, he’s just wondering how his room got so clean. He left it a mess that morning, if by “mess” you mean “slightly cluttered.” You want a mess, look at my childhood bedroom. At least you can see the floor in Tommy’s room.

Back to the matter at hand. While he was at school, Tommy’s bed was made, his toys were picked up, and his clothes were mended. How did all this happen? Obviously, they have brownies. The fairy kind, not the chocolate kind.

But what about the rest of the house? The kitchen was also a mess that morning, but now it’s been magically cleaned. All the dirty clothes in the hamper were washed, dried, and put away. The groceries that were thrown on the counter were also put away and the chicken was cooked. Oh boy. The brownies are all over the house. They’re going to have to put out traps.

Tommy and Mother rush to the front door to greet Tommy’s dad as he comes home from work. Hey, Mother is Miss Ellis from “Let’s Have Fewer Colds!” Hi, Miss Ellis! Since this is the 1950s, she had to quit her job when she got married and had a child. At least she’s not in that plague-ridden classroom anymore.

Today was payday, so Tommy’s dad is handing out allowances. Tommy gets a nickel while Mrs. nee Ellis gets some folding money.

An unspecified length of time later, they eat supper and leave the kitchen a mess again. Who will clean it up? Not Tommy, he gets put to bed right after supper. (This gives the brownies time to pop out of the cabinets to clean up.) His parents kiss him goodnight and leave. Then Tommy leaps out of bed. He forgot to put his nickel in his piggy bank! But that’s not a lot of money, though. Tommy wants money to go to shows and buy a super atomic airplane. Kid’s got expensive tastes for someone with a Porky Pig bank.

Tommy decides to go downstairs to ask Dad for a raise. This will also give him a chance to see if the brownie traps downstairs worked.

He sneaks down to the kitchen and peeks through the door. His parents are washing the dishes, and Mrs. nee Ellis is telling her husband all about her day. She began by cleaning up the kitchen, then moved on to cleaning Tommy’s room. She ironed all the clothes and cooked a chicken at the same time. Then she mended Tommy’s clothes. Mother was the brownie all along! Shyamalan twist!

What did Father do all day? Well, he went to work where he connected large cables to large electrical boxes. Then he got paid. Then he came home, put on a tie, and worked on the family budget. Then he fixed a broken chair with the longest clamp in the world.

Tommy goes back to his room and picks up his football. This inspires the narrator to introduce the metaphor of Family as Team. Tommy is the player on the bench because he’s totally useless. But what if he isn’t? What if he actually starts picking up after himself? Will that allow the narrator to beat the metaphor to death?

Yes. Yes it will.

Tommy comes off the bench when he puts his nickel in Porky’s barrel and puts his football away all by himself. After a week he’s ready to fix a broken train track piece, make his bed, and put the rest of his toys away. Then he can come down to help Mother with the dishes.

The narrator lectures on how children can help their parents by not being total slobs. If you polish Dad’s shoes, he might let you help him varnish a chair. Once you’ve gotten to the point where you put on a bow tie to wash the mirrors, you’ll get a raise in your allowance: a full quarter. “Super atomic airplane, here I come!” Tommy exclaims.

And that’s how Tommy started the Korean War.

Your Family

Today’s Saturday Short is “Your Family” from the Conformity Above All Else series. It’s the story of The Brent Family: Tony, Fluffy the Cocker Spaniel, Sister Nancy, Mother who always looks tired, and Father who just wants to be left alone for five minutes so he can read the paper in peace.

This is also one of those shorts where the narrator spends the whole time having a conversation with herself. Maybe The Brent Family are her dolls?

Tony comes in after playing outside with Fluffy. He takes off his boots and gives Mother a box that came in the mail. It’s their film back from the developer! Tony wants to know if they can watch the movie tonight. Probably not since dinner will be late. Nancy is at her music lesson and Mother has to make supper all by herself.

Tony sadly takes off his coat and hat. He gets Fluffy’s food and bowl down from the shelf and fixes the dog’s dinner. He makes Fluffy give him five before he’ll give her the bowl. Then he notices that Fluffy’s paws are muddy. Not only that, she’s tracked up the whole kitchen floor. But Tony is determined not to let anything get in the way of watching home movies that night. He offers to clean up the floor and Fluffy’s feet, as is only right since she’s his dog. Not only that he wants to help Mother with his own dinner as well. Mother is happy Tony’s finally doing some work around the house, so she agrees.

Please note in all of this scrubbing up, Tony never takes Fluffy’s harness off.

Once the floor is clean, Tony shells peas while Mother shaves the carrots. At long last dinner is ready. Nancy is back from her music lesson just in time to set the table. Rather fancy place settings for a casserole, but that’s the 1950s for you. Father is home from work on time as well and he promises Tony that they can watch the movies tonight.

Mother crams every inch of the table with supper. The family bows their head and prays for six seconds before tearing into their meal. It looks like that’s actually a meatloaf, not a casserole. My mistake. Either way, it’s the perfect bland, pleasant meal to have a bland, pleasant conversation over.

Nancy and Mother wash the dishes because they’re womenfolk. Father and Tony splice the title frames into the film and put it in the projector. Tony sets up the screen as Mother and Nancy escape the drudgery of the scullery. Now they can finally watch the movie Tony wouldn’t shut up about.

Lights off, roll film! “The Brent Family Together,” the first title card announces. “We Work Together.” Mother comes out of the front door to sweep snow off the steps. This is usually Father’s job but he’s behind the camera. Tony shovels snow the best he can (I’m cutting him slack, he’s only eight or so) while Nancy chips ice off the sidewalk.

“We Play Together.” Nancy is ice skating backwards. Tony is skating for the first time, which means he falls down a lot. Nancy helps Tony up and they skate around the lake together. Mother puts on her ice skates and joins them. Now they get their neighbor to hold the camera while all four of them skate together. “The End.”

So that’s what Tony kept going on and on about, huh? Well at least he cleaned up after his own dog so the afternoon wasn’t a total waste.

Sharing Work at Home

Today’s Saturday Short is “Sharing Work at Home.” It’s about home economics and how it can save your family.

We join the Dad and Howard in the middle of wallpapering the living room. Let us all give thanks to every deity ever conceived of by mankind that this film is in black and white because that wallpaper is hideous. Martha comes in with a plate of sandwiches and tells Howard to wash his hands. Mom follows with a tray of drinks. “Who would have thought we’d ever manage to redecorate this room,” she asks “and do all the work ourselves?”

The phone rings. While Martha runs across the room to answer it, we’re left wondering why they left the curtains up while they’re repapering. And why didn’t they cover the furniture with dropcloths? Oh well, they’ll figure it out when they have to clean wallpaper paste off of all their upholstery. Oh look, Martha’s finally answered the phone. It’s Mrs. Burton asking about the next meeting of the Neighborhood Club. Mom offers to have the meeting at her house next month so she can show up the new ugly wallpaper. And to have the Neighborhood Ladies swap ideas on how to get paste off of everything.

The narrator finally wanders in to talk about what a difference has been made in the Taylor family as well as the Taylor Home. He takes us on a flashback to the last time Mrs. Burton called and Martha answered the phone. She immediately starts complaining about her life. The living room is messy. Mother is not well. It’s hard to keep house without a mother to supervise. Mrs. Burton cuts Martha off as she starts yapping about her home ec book and says she’ll call back later when Martha is far, far away.

Martha goes back to her home ec text. “General cleaning is made much easier if each person picks up after himself,” she reads. Suddenly she has a revelation! Maybe they should help out by picking up their own junk! But what’s this? “Jobs such as vacuuming, scrubbing, and dusting must also be done.” Aw. Martha knocks over the lamp and tears the shade. “More work!” she moans.

She goes into the kitchen to join Howard’s pity party. He’s having trouble working the can opener. Martha shows him the home ec book and starts proselytizing. They need to cooperate and get organized! They immediately sit down to make A List.

Flash forward to the completed List as the kids show it to Mom who is well again. Howard promises that they’ll keep on helping out around the house, but he won’t clean anymore. That’s women’s work. Dad tells Howard that he still has to keep picking up after himself and that they’ll assign jobs based on time and ability rather than gender. Good for you, Dad. You nip that misogyny right in the bud!

Mom wants to know what she’s going to do. Cleaning the house was how she filled her empty days, after all. The kids claim they’ll do it all themselves but Mom’s a savvy woman. She knows that’s an empty promise. They’ll pick up one thing and then find seventy other things to do. She goes to the Holy Home Ec Book, turning to the page that lays out the Approved Roles for Family Members: Dad works and brings home the money, children go to school, and Mom keeps house. From these roles let us not deviate or it will bring down Societal Wrath.

Mom improves the chore list. Now the kids will clean their own rooms, Dad will clean the bathroom, and the odd jobs will go on a Honey-Do list. Howard announces proudly that the odd jobs will be done in their spare time. And that was why the odd jobs were never done.

We cut to a montage of the family trying out the New & Improved Chore List. Mom and Martha clean the living room together. Howard cleans his own room. Martha irons and sets the table (not at the same time, that would be silly). Dad washes the dishes. Howard scrubs the floor. Mom puts the trash can down.

Later, in the living room, Howard has finally gotten around to fixing the lampshade. It could use a new cover to replace the torn one. Mom offers to make one. Howard says the frame will be ready after he takes it to school to solder it together. “School!” Martha exclaims in horror. She had gotten so caught up in cleaning she forgot to go to school! No, wait, she has to pick out a sewing project for her home ec class. Why not a new slipcover for the davenport? Or “couch” as regular people call it. Or “sofa” if that’s your regionalism.

Dad says that new covers for the davenport and lamp will show off how dirty the walls are. Mom emphasizes this by moving a picture to show the dirt. Time to wash the walls, then. No, wait, Mom wants to redecorate the living room. Dad tries to stop her by mentioning how much a decorator will cost, but Howard eggs her on by mentioning how another family did all the work themselves. Dad, resigned to his fate, says they can borrow the tools and then they’d just have to pay for paper and paint.

Cut back to the half-papered living room. The narrator talks about how they’re better and happier now that they’re doing something together. They’ll all go blind together, too, from that horrible wallpaper pattern. Thanks home economics book!

Fun of Being Thoughtful

Today’s Saturday Short is “The Fun of Being Thoughtful,” part of the Everything Is Fun series.

We begin with a random teenagers wondering what thoughtfulness means, why is it important, and…hey look! It’s Nora and she’s writing a better social letter! Hi, Nora! Did you dump that arrogant jerk you were dating yet?

The narrator tells us that everywhere you go, people are talking about thoughtfulness. Are they? He’ll show us why thoughtfulness is so important by stalking following Jane (or is it Jean?) Proctor home to show how she uses thoughtfulness every day.

She comes home to find her brother Eddie by himself. Mom has gone downtown to pay the insurance premium. They know this because Mom has thoughtfully left a note. Jean/Jane is suspicious. Mom doesn’t usually pay the bills. At least, not until the collectors come knocking at the door. Then she reads where Mom wanted them to take the ground beef out of the freezer for supper. Eddie dashes to the kitchen to get the beef, but then the phone rings. It’s for him.

Jane thoughtfully goes to the kitchen while Eddie chats with his girlfriend. Jean returns to find him disconsolate by the phone. His girlfriend can’t go to The Party this weekend because her grandmother is sick. Eddie’s sad that he doesn’t have a date, but takes the time to hope Girlfriend’s grandma gets better. Jane sympathizes but is more concerned that she doesn’t have a new dress for The Party. Eddie scoffs at her worries, but he does so thoughtfully so it’s all right.

Jane suggests that she and Eddie make dinner since Mom will be late getting back from town. Eddie suggests that Jean pick up all the junk she’s dropped on the floor first. He goes to peel potatoes while Jane carries her and Eddie’s things upstairs.

Jean returns to the kitchen to find Eddie struggling with the potatoes. He asks her to put onions in his beef patty. Jane mentions that Eddie likes onions but Dad doesn’t like any. She notices things like that. Eddie says he’s not good at noticing, prompting Jean to thoughtfully tease him about noticing everything about the girls he likes. Then she has an idea! Why doesn’t Eddie ask the new girl in town to the party? She won’t have a date because she’s new. Eddie thinks that’s a swell idea but, aw, he can’t ask a girl this late. Jane tells him it would be the thoughtful thing to do. Eddie says he’ll think about it as he goes to set the table.

“Setting the table” apparently means “call the operator for the new girl’s number and then chicken out and hang up before she can give it to you.” Fortunately Mom and Dad come home in time to save Eddie from further humiliation. Mom goes upstairs to put something in Jean’s room while Eddie talks to Dad about asking the new girl out. Dad asks how Eddie would feel if he were in her place? Eddie perks up. He should ask her out! Maybe she doesn’t have a grandmother who will conveniently get sick right before The Party!

Jane yells at Eddie from the kitchen about how the onions are making her tear up. Eddie tells her their parents are home and she goes into a tizzy.

After dinner, Mom and Dad offer to do the dishes since Jean did all the cooking while Eddie was obsessing over his dating prospects. Jane goes upstairs to do her homework. Soon a shriek echoes down the stairs. Jean found a new dress on her bed, the very dress she wanted for The Party! She runs down to show it off. Eddie wolf whistles at her. STOP THAT. She is your SISTER.

Jane reacts by slapping her brother across the mouth for being a creep. Oh wait, no she doesn’t. She offers to double date with him and the new girl. Eddie immediately runs out to ask the new girl out. Going on a date with his sister is just too good a deal to pass up, even if they have to have their beards along! Jean goes back upstairs to do her homework. Mom and Dad bask in the thoughtfulness of their family. The viewers rush to the shower to scrub off the creepy incest vibes that Coronet family films always exude.

Friendship Begins at Home

Today’s Saturday Short is “Friendship Begins at Home,” part of the Overly Dramatic series. It’s the story of Barry and why he has no friends.

When we first meet Barry, he’s lending his friend George his tennis racquet and a stack of books. Barry assures George that he won’t need the racquet since he’s going on a camping trip with his family. George assures Barry that his friends will miss him and leaves. Barry goes into the living room and slumps into an armchair after leaning another tennis racquet on another pile of books.

Mom and sister Diane come in. Mom scolds Barry for not being ready to go. Barry starts whining about how he had to wash the car ALL BY HIMSELF except his friend George came over and he was able to rope him into helping him. “It’s a good thing I have friends,” he declaims. Then he notices that Diane is wearing his shirt. Barry yells at her and jumps up, putting his foot right through the tennis racquet. Little brother Dick comes in right on cue. “My tennis racquet!” he cries, tears running down his face.

Mom tells Dick not to cry, Barry will let him use his racquet. But I’ve already lent it to George, Barry replies. “I wish you’d show as much consideration for your family as you do for your friends!” Mom says. Spotlight on Barry as he goes into a monologue about how no one in his family appreciates him. Why is everybody always picking on him?

Because, Barry, as noted philosopher Jimmy Pop once said, “no one likes you, monkey boy!”

Dad come in to find out what the hold up is. They should have been on the road hours ago. Barry declares dramatically that he will not go on the camping trip this year. He would rather stay here with his…friends. Mom, Diane, and Dick react to this, but Dad doesn’t care. He tells Barry to charge his groceries at the store, hands him a wad of bills, and herds everyone else out to the car because it is past time to hit the road. We should have been there by now, his acting implies.

As soon as they leave Barry calls up his girlfriend Lorraine to tell her that he can make it to her party this weekend! We fade to black before Lorraine can make a halfhearted attempt to be happy about this news. She specifically scheduled the party this weekend to make sure Barry wouldn’t be there. Now what?

Later Barry enjoys the pleasures of lolling around in bed all day. Suddenly the phone rings! “It must be one of my friends!” he announces to no one. He rushes downstairs to answer it but, alas, it was a call for his sister. Barry wonders why his friends haven’t called him. We know what he doesn’t: they’re all avoiding him.

It’s 10:10 at night. Barry and George come home from the movies. Barry brags about how he can do whatever he wants whenever he wants because he’s a “free man.” George retaliates by bragging about how his mom cooked dinner for him that night so he doesn’t have to scrounge through a half-empty refrigerator. Barry in turn borrows his tennis racquet back from George who flounces out the door. Barry fumes about how George is using HIS racquet to play with OTHER PEOPLE before doing a complete 180 and wondering why George hasn’t invited him over for dinner since his folks are out of town. Barry, honey, it’s time to face facts: he’s just not that into you.

Barry has a loud internal monologue about the use of friends and how great it is to have Mom cook for you as he heats up a can of beans. He tosses the empty can into the trash can which, after a quick dissolve, is filled with bean cans and one lonely soup can. Do not light a match in that house. Barry complains about how bored his is with beans, beans, the musical fruit as he contemplates his empty wallet. Gee, wouldn’t it be great if Dad was around to hand him another wad of bills? Dad’s always giving Barry money to go away.

The phone rings. Barry dashes over, hoping this time it’s for him. It is! It’s Lorraine! She’s cancelling the party. She’s suddenly fallen ill cough cough. “Okay,” Barry says sadly, hanging up the phone. “He bought it!” Lorraine calls over her shoulder at all the other teenagers in town. “He’s not coming!” “Yay!” they cheer as they crank up the Pat Boone.

With nothing else to look forward too, Barry decides it’s time to get a job. He calls George to see if he can talk his boss at the garage into hiring Barry.

Four days later Barry is tired from working. But, his boss says he’s a good mechanic so maybe he ought to give college a miss and revise all his life plans based on one compliment. Then the loneliness finally drives Barry insane. He begins hallucinating members of his family and the one time they were nice to him. He comes to the conclusion that he has no friends outside of his family. He picks up Dick’s broken racquet and strides purposefully off camera.

A few days later Barry is on his hands and knees scrubbing the kitchen floor. He hears a car pull up in the driveway and bounds into the living room with way too much enthusiasm. They’re home! His family is home! His only friends! Barry and Mom have a heart-to-heart while Diane talks on the phone. Dick comes in all mopey until he finds what Barry left on his bed: a new tennis racquet! The ultimate symbol of love! How wonderful!

Then it’s Diane’s turn to come in all mopey. Her boyfriend just cancelled on her and now she doesn’t have anyone to go to Lorraine’s party (now in it’s second week) with. No fear, Barry has an idea!

That evening Barry (all dressed up) is talking to Dad about taking the car to the garage to work on during his slack time. Dad agrees, thrilled to finally have a source of free car repair. Mom brings in Diane, all dressed up. Oh no.

“Well,” Mom says, “how do we look?”

“Wow,” Barry replies, “is that MY sister?”

Yes, Barry. Yes it is. YOUR SISTER. You do not date YOUR SISTER.

“Are you sure you don’t mind?” Diane asks. “I only hope that I can show you a good time,” HER BROTHER says.

PARENTS STEP IN AND SEPARATE THEM NOW. Oh, wait, you’re just going to let them go? You really don’t care that your son and daughter are going on a date? Really? Yep. They think it’s cute. At least Mom does, Dad doesn’t seem to care. Mom turns on Dick next, telling him that his family is the only friend he will ever have. Cue triumphant music.

And that’s why Child Protective Services exists.

Obligations

Today’s Saturday Short is “Obligations” from 1950, part of the “Better Than You” collection. Who is better than you? It’s not Mr. Thaddeus K. Smith, that’s for sure. First of all, his name is Thaddeus so he’s already at a severe disadvantage. Second of all, he has a very messy desk. Third of all, he’s a jerk who yells at his secretary for not knowing where he lost a report. Or maybe that’s the narrator’s fantasy since he (the narrator) seems to like having long, involved imaginary conversations with himself.

From the office we go to the Smith residence. It is a disgraceful place according to the narrator because the props department has tossed random items in their front lawn. Inside is just as shocking because it looks like an actual family with actual children lives there! Quelle horreur! Mrs. Smith keeps getting distracted from tidying up because everyone expects her to know where they’ve lost something and then bring it to them. She is the most realistic mom in any educational short ever.

Next up we have their neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Perfect with their children Junior and Sis. They live in a model home that is only slightly less realistic than the one in Arrested Development. (RIP Lucille Blum) We join Sis in her extremely fluffy bedroom as she straightens things up before school. Because we all know how much high school students love getting up early to clean their rooms. Meanwhile Junior is making fishing flies at his Own Personal Desk because he’s a boy and doesn’t have to clean up.

The Perfects gather around a card table for breakfast. They have a bland, pleasant meal while the narrator yammers on about how Breakfast Is The Most Important Meal Of The Day. Sis get’s everyone’s lunchboxes for them because she’s the girl and has to make everyone’s lunches for them. Also, she’s taking a homemaking class! Fancy-pantsy! No ordinary Home Economics course for our Sis!

After school Junior and Sis do their homework. The narrator is shocked–SHOCKED!–that they’re doing it at 4:00 because apparently you’re supposed to wait until the dead of night to do your homework? I do not understand his confusion. He sorts it out, though, when he learns that Junior and Sis want to listen to a special program on the radio that night.

We cut to the kids grooving to some extremely generic jazz while Mom & Dad play bridge downstairs. (Please notice that the card table they’re playing at is larger than their breakfast table.) After the show Sis throws Junior’s shoes out of him to get him out of her room, then goes downstairs to serve refreshments at the bridge party because she’s a girl and has to serve coffee and cookies. Also she’s taking a homemaking class! And mom told her she had to since she has to make sandwiches for Sis’s parties.

Over the weekend, brother washes and waxes the car because he’s a boy while Sis helps Mom vacuum and dust the living room because she’s a girl. Afterward Sis tends her flowerbed to the accompaniment of the narrator who thinks we don’t know what green thumb means.

Sometime in the indeterminate future, Sis’ tennis racquet sprung a string so Junior lends her his. Tennis racquets in the 1950s were more valuable than gold to educational short teenagers. We will see more about this in upcoming films.

When the narrator notices Father giving the kids their allowances, he takes the opportunity to lecture us about proper spending and saving habits. Little does he know we’ve already watched Your Thrift Habits so his refresher course is totally unnecessary. It is notable that Junior and Sis use their spending money to continue to conform to gender stereotypes. Girls don’t fish! That’s dirty boy work! And boys don’t ever need to get a new shirt! Clothes shopping is women’s work!

Because this short isn’t long enough, the narrator gives us a thorough recap of everything we’ve watched in the last ten minutes. He reminds us that the Smiths are ordinary people and that’s bad. “A family in a state of perpetual chaos is really just a family that isn’t living up to its own responsibilities,” he intones sententiously. What the hell narrator? If you’re not a pleasant robot doing your pre-planned routine you’re a failure? I guess so.

And that’s why the 1950s sucked.

Is This Love?

Today’s Saturday Short wants to know “Is This Love” that I’m feeling? Is this the love that I’ve been searching for? Is this love? Or am I dreaming? It must be love ’cause it’s really got a hold on Peg. A hold on Peg.

We meet Peg as she runs up to the entrance to the women’s dorm. She goes up to the biggest dorm room in the history of the universe where a 40-year-old woman is brushing her hair. This woman is Peg’s roommate Liz. The makers of this short believe it’s possible to suspend enough disbelief to accept her as a 21-year-old college student. Ain’t gonna happen.

Peg announces that she’s gotten engaged to her boyfriend Joe. Liz is shocked–Peg and Joe have only been dating a few months. “Three months and three days,” Peg says, falling backwards onto Liz’s bed. Not only are they engaged, but Joe might be getting signed to a pro football team sometime in the future. Liz tries to talk sense into Peg. She’s only got a year left of college, and insert your favorite football joke about Joe. (Hi, I’m not a sports fan.) Wouldn’t it make more sense to finish her home ec degree and graduate before she got her MRS? Marriage isn’t something to rush into, after all. Peg accuses Liz of being old fashioned because she dated her boyfriend for a year and a half before they got engaged and storms off to send a telegram to her parents.

The next day Liz meets her fiance Andy at the cafe. Andy is struggling with his essay for English and quickly cons Liz into writing it for him. He notices Peg and Joe coming in and Liz tells him they’re engaged. Andy scoffs at their happiness, believing as Liz does that love is a contract. They have a brief flashback to their dull affair culminating in a wordless proposal. Please note how Andy struggles to get the ring on Liz’s finger.

Liz and Peg go back to the dorm where Peg’s parents, fresh from their trip to 1935, are waiting in the lobby. Peg’s dad tries to suss out Joe’s future prospects as a football star while her mom frets uselessly. They, like Liz, try to convince her to wait until after she graduates. Dad even offers to buy Joe and Peg a house if they will only hold off another year. Peg, however, is firmly committed to her impatience. She doesn’t care that she can get a house for the low, low price of a fifteen-month engagement, she wants to be married NOW NOW NOW. She throws a tantrum and storms off.

I spent most of the next scene trying to figure out just where in the heck Peg and Joe were snuggling up. No lie, I honestly thought the rear view mirror was a window until Joe moved. That’s why I can’t give you a synopsis of their conversation. Rest assured that they are still determined to get married as soon as legally possible. Clearly neither of them has ever heard of a mortgage or what a pain it can be or their wedding planning would be coming to a screeching halt for the next few months. We all did stupid things in our twenties. They’ll learn the hard way, just like we all did.

The next morning Liz meets Peg’s parents in the dorm lobby. She gives them a letter that Peg left on her desk that morning. The letter says that she and Joe eloped the night before. Peg’s mom is heartbroken at the thought of such as scandalous start to her little girl’s married life. What will the neighbors think when they heard Peg eloped? Mom will never be able to show her face back in the 1930s ever again. Liz sympathetically walks them out to their car where she has the decency to wait until they drive off before parading down the sidewalk with Andy, enveloped in a cloud of smug superiority.

The narrator pipes up to add to the air of doom surrounding Peg and Joe’s wedding. And it is doomed, I agree. Not because they’re eloping but because they’re too busy making out to WATCH THE FREAKING ROAD. As they walk into the justice of the peace’s office the narrator wonders if their marriage will work out. Will this relationship stand the test of time? Is it love or just infatuation? I’m not sure so I’ll turn this over to love expert David Coverdale for his take on the matter.