Mom’s Podcast, on and on, nothing changes, all planes change

I wrote a few weeks ago about my mother and her soap operas, you know, the daytime dramas that were on from about 1- 3 pm. Scheduled right after she got her morning household chores done and before the kids came home from school. That was life for the middle-aged, middle class housewife.

Even the term house wife seems archaic.

Anyway, I was reminded of this as I watched my daughter doing her business while walking around wearing headphones. She subscribes to a podcast.

You can tell the generational difference: me, a baby boomer, has recently subscribed to Country Living magazine as a way to disengage from the world and all the stressful news. She, a millennial, has decided to pay for exclusive content from the podcast. I asked her what that meant.

Of course, she rolled her eyes at me. (Just kidding, but it felt like it.) Behind the paywall (again, these terms!) she is privileged to take part in group chats, given access to YouTube videos to watch interviews that normal listeners aren’t linked into, and a few other premiums I had a hard time figuring out.

I was, again, reminded of Mom. She used to get on the phone—an avocado-colored wall phone with an extra-long cord so that she could navigate the kitchen while whipping up a cake and have the receiver tucked under her chin, held there by her shoulder. She’d chat with her friends about the latest episode in their soaps. It was as if they were gossiping about real people instead of characters in a drama.

Did you know she was pregnant?

And who is the father?

Of course, yes.

But what about her husband?

On and on. I only heard the conversation from her end, thinking how stupid. 

I should have been more empathetic about her existential life, a world where reality was second to what happened on TV, a life where her emotions were engaged with made-up people while those closest to her were somewhat relegated to the background.

Not to say this is my daughter. But, yeah, we all need a break from the intensity of the moment, the piles of laundry, the shitstorm of news constantly hitting the fan, the endless winter outside the sliding glass doors, the yoghurt the baby threw at the wall, on and on.

I guess I was more or less thinking about how these breaks are delivered these days. Mom had to wait for her show to come on and then stay glued to the TV (maybe vacuum during the commercial breaks). Her schedule had to revolve around the soaps, whereas today we have much more flexibility to access content according to our availability.

For all of us needing mental health breaks—I get it. As I delve into my Country Living, pretending I’m Martha Stewart, I’ll leave others to their Daily, their Ezra Klein, their Call Her Daddy, Strangers on a Bench . . .

On and on.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-happiness-lab-with-dr-laurie-santos/id1474245040