I can get behind this
My kids say, “He said to me
and I’m like, and he’s like, and she’s like…”
It’s all, “He’s all, she’s
all…”
I can’t get behind that kinda like… English
— William Shatner, “I Can’t Get Behind
That”
My wife and I try hard to minimize our children’s immersion in
popular culture. I do love pop culture myself, though like most of us, I
suppose myself to be discerning about it (ha). And I want to share some of my
enjoyment with my kids, but what and how? The arch sarcasm of so much of what
we currently have distresses me somehow. I mean, The Simpsons is smart and funny, but it’s
so cynical. Do little kids need that? Do they have the tools to parse it?
So we’ve embarked on a three-season mission to explore the
original Star Trek series. I’ve heard
that some network is reworking the terrible special effects to make it appeal
to a new generation, but my kids are loving it in all
its lofty atrocity. I used to laud its silliness, the great Mr. Spock, the
moments of Shakespearean grandeur. And I still love all that.
But I’m on a Shatner binge of late.
That go-for-the-gusto melodrama sends me, and that great voice of his. This led
me to Has Been, Bill’s recent record
produced by Ben Folds, which is, as my buddy Carl says, “as good as the first
album is bad.” If you have to ask…
So if you see three kids at the supermarket yelling, “I’m Captain
Kirk! I’M CAPTAIN KIRK!” Now you’ll know why. In Shatner
I trust.
This article appears in Nov 8-14, 2006.
