The 20th reason for not crying during your daughter’s senior year is the Bachelor. The Bachelor has been around for years, in fact, according to Siri, it began the year my senior was born (2002). It’s a soapy, silly reality TV drama whose appeal I have never quite understood.
Back in the busy, brainless years of raising a pile of babies and toddlers all at once, I was known to very occasionally indulge, but I found it difficult to commit to a standing time each week (back in those prehistoric days when one was required to actually be home every Monday night at seven to stay current on TV shows). And, anyway, the whole premise always made me uncomfortable—it seemed very anti-feminist AND unchristian to me (the overnight dates make my skin crawl on so many levels). Recently, however, I have learned just how very widespread the popularity of the Bachelor is, even for deeply Christian speakers/podcasters that I follow and aggressive feminists that I know. I even heard the other day about a group of nuns who refused to schedule some weekly event (service or Bible study or similar) on Monday nights because it conflicted with their weekly Bachelor party. Last spring when I spent 80% of my vacation days touring colleges with Grace, the number one answer to “what do you do for fun?” was “we have a weekly Bachelor night.”
In our house, Grace has initiated this ritual. My goal for this blog is to post every Tuesday, and as of today I am hereby revising that to Fridays so I can join in the family fun on Monday nights. I still don’t love the Bachelor (last night I was strictly instructed on pain of expulsion that I must completely refrain from commenting on how weird it was for him to make out with 6 to 8 different girls in the course of a single episode). I still question the moral foundation I am instilling in my children by indulging in their new little habit. But it is campy, silly fun, and if I’m there with them I can be sure to provide an alternative perspective to the absurd construct of that show. They greatly appreciate my insight, as you might imagine.
I am absolutely certain that Grace will join whatever group is watching the Bachelor every week next year. She’ll cuddle up on dorm couches with snacks and a gaggle of girls and groan and gasp and laugh at the antics of the ridiculous individuals on the show. This year, her 8 year old brother is the most engaged with her. He knows every character by name, has opinions on their level of drama, and last night insisted that he would only pick the active, athletic ones (which his sisters and I all applaud). Last night, the dog had already claimed my lap, so Clay climbed unselfconsciously onto his sister’s lap from which place they discussed merits and drawbacks of person after person. Not crying.
Last night, the cast visited Costa Rica, which we visited as a family last November. We all sighed collectively over our memories as the lucky Bachelor visited waterfalls and jungles. We were delighted by shots of toucans and sloths and reminisced about the rainfall and our adventures. Not crying.
This post will be short and uninspired today, because I am tired after that 3 hour marathon of Bachelor watching last night. I am also committed to Bachelor parties for the rest of my life—because next year I’ll call my girl and recap cattily, even though it’s not really either of our styles. Next year she won’t cuddle her brother or discuss the pros and cons of various contestants in the moment. We won’t debate hair-dos and dresses and tactics as they are happening. Instead, we’ll try and connect on the phone sometime later that week, and given the complexities of all our collective schedules, it will never quite be the same. I’m not crying that I’ve inadvertently developed one more thing to miss about my girl next year. I’m not crying that our chances to develop new rituals and shared interests while living under the same roof are becoming vanishingly small.
It’s just stupid reality TV with quite a questionable premise. It’s simply three hours (!) of couch time I could surely have spent more productively and sanely. It’s just the untimely elimination of one of my underdog favorites (Oh, Lexi—nice girls don’t finish first—even if they do look like the Little Mermaid). It’s just the objectification of women who readily choose it for themselves (I don’t know, disagree with me) and one fairly irritating young man in no way worthy of this sort of attention. It’s just shrinking hours at home with my girl watching a show I’ve managed to effectively ignore for the better part of 18 years. I’m not crying, you’re crying.
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