Published April 22, 2007 in the Hibbing Daily Tribune
I’ve learned that when you tell parenting stories you need to distance yourself from claiming any sort of expertise. It’s a little like advertising for mutual funds; past performance is not indicative of future results.
I say this because if you had talked to me eight months ago I might have told you – OK, bragged – that our son Henry didn’t show much interest in TV. He would watch a few minutes here and there, but spent more time playing with blocks or trucks. I might have assumed that the logical progression from this would have been for Henry to eschew TV entirely, build a perpetual motion machine by age five and staff our household with fully-functional, non-evil robot servants before he hit junior high.
This was, of course, before he saw his first “Thomas the Tank Engine” video and got hooked on his 4 o’clock “Curious George” fix. Naturally, both programs have book and toy counterparts. Now we see more trains and monkeys than an Amtrak conductor on Planet of the Apes.
“Thomas the Tank Engine” has been around a long time. I remember when Ringo Starr was the “conductor” who told stories of the cavalcade of self-aware, adventure-prone trains on the fictional Island of Sodor. In the years since, both Alec Baldwin and George Carlin have narrated Thomas stories. I’m pretty sure this is the only thing Ringo Starr, Alec Baldwin and George Carlin have in common. (If you want to blow your mind, watch George Carlin narrate a Thomas story and then put on his comedy album with the “Seven Words You Can’t Say on Television.”)
Thematically, the best “Thomas” video we’ve seen is “Races, Rescues and Runaways (one of the Baldwin videos). This video features a series of adventures in which trains, blinded by pride or power, attempt to do something they shouldn’t with disastrous results. Trains derail, crash into box cars full of jam and burst into buildings full of people. Outside of Sodor their actions would cause a near endless string of drug and alcohol tests for their plastic human crews. In the videos, however, humans show a glib, almost nonchalant attitude toward these rail yard debacles. If real life rules applied, several of these yard workers would be splayed out on tracks while Poindexter the Ambulance (TM) went looking for salvageable limbs.
The video ends with a musical montage recapping the very best of the rail disasters set to a tune called “Accidents Happen.” I haven’t been able to locate the exact lyrics to this song, but to my ear one of the refrains goes, “Accidents happen now and again, people and trains get smashed.” This reminds me of a story an ex-railroader told me about a northern Minnesota town where, when the train slowed to pass through, the railroad crew would jump off the train, run to a nearby liquor store, and run back to the accelerating train with beer. Indeed, people and trains DO get smashed. (I’ve been assured that stores like these are part of a bygone era of railroading, which has since seen massive safety improvements … except in Sodor).
I haven’t analyzed Curious George much here. I
won’t have
enough space to explore the complex relationship between a bachelor who
lives
in the city and wears yellow safari clothes every day and his monkey,
who in
real life would be on the 10 o’clock news every night.
I’m still glad that Henry likes these programs instead of Barney, the Wiggles and the Teletubbies (all horror shows for adults). We may have TV in our lives, which might possibly prevent Henry from getting his Ph.D. by age 20. But I am glad to have learned so much about the travails of jaunty little trains and a monkey who often breaks the law in a very, very cute way. The parenting train just keeps on choogling along.
Aaron J. Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing Daily Tribune.