Dreams

My niece stayed home from daycare today as she was running a fever last night into this morning.  I spent the day wearing a mask, although I’d spent a lot of time yesterday with them on my lap, so I’m probably exposed to anything.  Her fever dropped but rose again this evening, and my nephew is a little out of sorts at the same time, so we might be in for infection!  Fingers crossed that it’s nothing serious and it will pass quickly.  Last night Don complained of tummy troubles, (as did I, several hundred kilometres away, and on a different diet) but he was fine this morning.  Jerry had a long run yesterday afternoon, which got some of his fidgets out of him but he was again antsy this morning.  I felt a little more myself this morning, but I’m definitely feeling the effects of overexertion today.  I fell asleep in my chair this afternoon for a while, and I am having difficulty walking and standing, plus having considerable pain.  I’ll have another day of rest tomorrow, and hopefully I’ll avoid whatever it is that the kids have.

I had a conversation with some friends of my sister’s on the weekend.  When they arrived, my niece was glued to Cinderella III (No, I didn’t know that there was a part 2, let alone a third part!) and could barely look away long enough to eat.  They made a comment about ensuring that children “understood the meaning behind fairy tales,” and they looked like they were about to begin the long-standing diatribe about the violence and misogyny inherent in them.  My views, which I recorded in this blog entry about 7 years ago, haven’t changed.  I think that fairy tales are necessary for our growth and development and they contain many valuable lessons.  I don’t know exactly what’s expected of us in terms of stories, because I’m really not a huge fan of many recent stories for children, nor of the cartoons.  I loved the old Sesame Street, and the wonderfully integrated neighbourhood it showed, with all the lives being just accepted normally.  There were various ethnicities all living side by side, and included someone who was hearing  impaired in a normal relationship.  Then they introduced some new muppets who were supposed to appeal to younger children, and seemed to have more emphasis on pointing out differences.  I’ve worked on increasing inclusivity in the workplace and I’ve always found that stressing how different a group is just increases tension and pushes people further away.  There’s a balance point to be attained, where people are allowed to live their own lives and where they can be understood and appreciated for their differences.

I’ve lived through having to be the representative of my people — where people think that all Trinidadians are like me, and are surprised to find that I’m not what they expected.  And there are others who try to live up to the stereotypes of their own groups, or avoid them altogether.  Stereotypes are necessary shortcuts that we use to classify groups and to predetermine how we react.  They are handy, but if we rely too heavily on them we lose our rationality.  So we use them to be aware of how to respect differences, but at the same time we need to evaluate individuals.  What I’m saying, rather clumsily, is that there’s a point where we have to ask people what’s best for them, as opposed to assuming a result.  And where this relates to fairy tales is that they provide some escapes from reality while helping us learn how to cope with evil.  Add to that, we almost always find what we seek.  So if we look for misogyny and hatred, we’ll find it.  If we look for heroism and bravery, we’ll find that, too.  For myself, I look for the positives first, and find ways of dealing with the negatives, which can always be overwhelming.

It’s story time now… I’m telling my niece stories of bravery and heroism, and how to change the world.  She enjoys Cinderella, because of the music and the talking animals, so I’ll watch it (under duress) as often as needed.  I’ll find other ways of getting around the negatives in the stories, but the point is to get her to enjoy reading and stories, we can discuss minutiae as she gets older and asks other questions.  Good night now!