"Pour Me..."

TODAY SUCKED. I've been disappointed in my body, didn't feel good, the advisement center on campus went out of their way to make me feel guilty for wanting to take another semester of classes, and to top it all off my husband went on a trip and our last moments before he left were spent being grumpy with each other because we both had a stressful day.

As soon as he shut the door behind him I let out all my pent up crying and turned on "The Good Place" to distract me. Then I got a text from an old coworker who was in SLC for a job interview. (We've worked together the past couple summers in Ohio.) We decided to meet up and have dinner in Salt Lake with my sister and a friend tagging along. It was a fun evening that distracted me from my problems, and if there's one thing the drive to or from Salt Lake is good for it's jamming out.

My sister was in charge of picking the songs from my phone and it felt SO GOOD to just belt out songs we both know and love. Everything from "In the Ghetto" by Elvis to "Whiskey Glasses" by Morgan Wallen.

Even though I'm not a drinker, there's nothing like singing a country drinking song to get out all your pitiful feelings.

"Pour me
Pour me another drink
'Cause I don't wanna feel a thing
No more, hell nah
I just wanna sip till the pain wears off."


I didn't drink away my sorrows tonight, but I sure ate and sang them away. And it felt great.

Babysitting Made Easy

I babysat my niece, Lily this week. I was kind of nervous because if I'm being honest I'm not that great with kids. I love kids! But somehow I just don't know how to act around them. And now babysitting Lily is going to be a weekly occurrence!

She started out our evening together by crying and just saying, "Mommy, Daddy! Mommy, Daddy!" Definitely a great start.

BUT! I knew one thing would save the day. Youtube. We watched baby video after baby video. The wheels on the bus do in fact go 'round and 'round. Baby shark doo doo doo doo doo doo. All the good stuff.

This all made me think of 2 things.

1. How crazy is it that all of us are introduced to media through basically the same thing. Little baby songs and movies.

2. I cannot judge any parents who may use media in ways that the American Association of Pediatricians would frown upon. This definitely kept her occupied and more importantly NOT CRYING FOR TWO HOURS.

Currently, there are 3 children at my house. One is autistic, two are a year-and-a-half old. We've got our hands full. Media is definitely going to be a tool to keep the place from burning down.

Murder? NBD.

One of my favorite shows at the moment is Criminal Minds. The idea of FBI agents using their knowledge of psychology, the way humans think and act, to catch their bad guys is SO cool. They seem like psychics when they make their profiles with details like, "this unsub feels unappreciated in the workplace..." or, "He keeps a notepad in his right jacket pocket listing his kills," to help law enforcement figure out what type of person committed the crime. 

In the episode I'm currently watching, S2E14 "The Big Game", a wealthy couple had been murdered in their home after they hosted a Superbowl party and the killers somehow hacked into their laptop to use the webcam and make a video of the kill. This video became viral and millions of people across the world had viewed it and people thought it was "pretty cool". Jason Gideon, the leader of the Behavioral Analysis Unit, mutters disparagingly, "Murder as entertainment," when he learns of the video. JJ, the team's communications specialist follows him by saying, "They probably don't realize it's real. People see so many images online every day, they might assume it's marketing for a horror film or something." 

I know, I know...this is a fictional situation. But is it?

This got me thinking of just how easy it is to desensitize ourselves to violent and aggressive behavior when we are constantly viewing it on our screens in the name of entertainment. When we see murder and violence and fighting as entertainment in our various movies, shows, and video games each day, it changes our nature. The shock value eventually goes away. 

Personally, I can't stand violent media. It will literally make me nauseous to sit through a fight scene in an action movie. In fact, in a high school sociology class, we were watching a movie with a particularly intense, violent scene and I had to leave the room because I'd almost passed out! Even in Criminal Minds when they show the murderer killing their victim at the beginning of each episode, I skip over it every time. However, I can see how over my life-span as I've been exposed to more and more aggressive media how it has become somewhat normal to me. And that's even with me still cringing through the fight scenes in the Avengers movies! 

It's probably not possible to undo the damage that's already done, but we can be more mindful of what media we're consuming and what it's doing to change our ways of thinking, what's now normal to us that wasn't in the past. I agree with what Derek Morgan, another BAU team member, said after JJ made her observation. "The world is pretty screwed up." But now that I know that, it makes me want to put out wholesome media into the world to balance the scales between the uplifting and the aggressive or disheartening. So even though the damage has been done, we can still be mindful media consumers to make better choices in what we watch so that we can lessen the effects on our own lives and hopefully influence those around us to do the same.