Just call me "Dummy Dearest". It started when I had the television on. I rarely watch it -- don't have time and find it to be mostly a
wasteland. I have to confess I've never seen a single episode of "ER", haven't a clue as to who's who in X-Files and I still don't know -- or care -- who shot J.R..
I really quit watching TV about the time "Mary Tyler
Moore" was cancelled, although I was a quasi-"Cheers" fan for years. My all-time favorite show, however, was an episode of "WKRP" where Les and the station manager cooked up a scheme at Thanksgiving to drop turkeys out of a
helicopter at a shopping center as a promotional stunt. Only they dropped live ones and turkeys can't fly. It was hilarious then and it's hilarious now. And, best of all, it's clean humor.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not a
prude, but I must confess to being taken aback by some of the things I've seen on television while trolling for the weather report. Soft porn, dirty language, innuendo stacked a mile high -- there's a lot to be avoided if you're
the parents of small kids. So we keep a sharp eye on what our children watch. And that's why what happened makes me feel so rotten. Because I exposed my son and his friend to something they really didn't need to see.
I had
turned the TV on one evening while ironing and heard on PBS that Kathleen Turner -- she of the smoky voice and my favorite contemporary actress -- was going to be hosting a show about love among ancient societies. I thought it
meant romantic love, feelings -- that sort of thing. But it was on quite late and I didn't want to stay up, so I taped it. A few days later I plugged the tape in and was taken aback to find Miss Turner introducing ancient and very
explicit erotic art. Not what I had in mind at all so I rewound the tape and forgot about it.
Later I taped several hours of cartoons for my son to take on a trip with him. He and his friend, Ryan, never got around to
watching the cartoons, though, so he brought the tapes, all labeled "cartoons" back home and stacked them in the den, where we all forgot about them. Until the other day, that is.
My son grabbed a cartoon tape from the pile
and the boys went into the playroom. A few minutes later I stuck my head in and found the two seven-year-olds standing, transfixed, in front of the screen, their eyes as big as Frisbees as they watched a steady parade of ancient
erotic art -- which left nothing to the imagination, take my word for it. (The boys, by the way, were not complaining about the "odd" cartoons.)
