TV: The win-win

I love when it's raining. The kids get to watch TV all day and I get to feel like there's no other option. WIn-win!

From what I remember of my own childhood, I spent countless hours in front of a much less educational television set watching shows like The A-Team and Smothers Brothers. I am no brain surgeon, and I wouldn't want to be. Who wants those kind of hours and that kind of pressure? Blame TV for my failures as a human being if you like, but I'm perfectly content with my career, and I can play six degrees of Kevin Bacon like nobody's business. The first R-rated movie I remember seeing was Halloween 4. I think I was 6. Today, that would be child abuse. Back then it was decent parenting.

Nowadays if you let your child watch more than 30 minutes of educational, murder-free TV in a day, you feel neglectful, ready to justify your actions to complete strangers. "She had to watch an hour today! I know, I'm terrible, but I was vomiting non-stop and haven't slept in two days." To which the complete stranger replies, "You probably just ruined her chances of becoming a brain surgeon, you know." Oh well. Someone has to mop up after surgery.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends children under 2 get absolutely no screen time. Which is actually impossible, considering you can't walk into a room anymore without seeing a screen. Just look around when you go to the mall, or the supermarket. Yes, those screens do count, according to the AAP. Our entire lives revolve around screens now. So really, when you think about it, keeping our kids from them is kind of a disservice. Eventually they'll enter the real world, and by then their little Pre-K classmates will be typing dissertations and giving presentations on their iPads, and your kid will be awed at the magic of a touch screen, like a kitten chasing a beam of light. Bless his little heart.

Do you need to look up an address and get directions? Use your phone. Writing in your journal? You're probably doing it on your computer. Signing your name to pay with a credit card at the grocery store? Reading the news? More often than not you're doing those things on a screen. You can say it's depressing, or frightening, or that it will be the downfall of our society. But you can't say it's avoidable, unless you plan on moving into a cave, in which case you can avoid screens, potato chips, and sugary drinks all in one fell swoop.

So if my kids are going to be staring at cash register screens, and ads at the mall, and the large screen TV they actually have in the doctor's office waiting room, then why can't I use my own TV to keep my kids happy for a bit while I do something for myself? Netflix is bursting at the seems with programming that has taught my kids more than I would ever think to teach them myself, so it is quite possibly a better parent than I am. And the mother of the year award goes to... my television! For always being there, always listening, always being patient even when the kids are screaming at it, and never telling them to please go away while mommy finishes this one last thing.

Some of you naysayers are thinking, "If they're going to be exposed to screens all day for the rest of their lives, the home should be the 'safe zone' that is TV-free." And to that I say, "You are crazy." Without TV, I would get nothing done. TV is my friend. A close friend I trust with my children while I take a shower and clean the toilets, or heaven forbid, sleep.

Now, to just rid myself of the nagging feeling that I am the world's most neglectful parent for allowing my oldest to watch Cinderella while I spent my afternoon writing about how I'm justified in letting her watch Cinderella.

Oh, right. It's raining. Win-win!