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The Castaways of Gilligan’s Island: The American Pantheon

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I had been looking forward to introducing my ten year old to Gilligan’s Island, and after watching the pilot (available on Amazon Prime), I now understand why this show manages to linger in my conscience long after its many contemporaries have faded away. This show echoes today among the various reality shows and in most ensemble comedies. What is Community, if not Gilligan’s Island transplanted and transmogrified. The appeal is in the crystallization of middle American archetypes of Kennedy-era America into a pantheon. If in an alternative reality, we worshipped a nature-based divinity with seven aspects, we would worship these “Six and One in One.” If you are honest with yourself, you may admit that you already do.

The Six non-Gilligan castaways represent important aspects of the American psyche. The Skipper is the authority figure, having a presumed backstory as a veteran, but lapsed into a pudgy softness that is almost maternal -observe the moobs. He is in fact both parents who are equally ineffectual. The Millionaire is America’s 1%, ascotted, bilious, and lockjawed, he is married to Lovey, who represents America’s fading glory. The Professor is representative of America’s science and technology -he is the space program, modern medicine, and computers, but is sterile -his shirts are white, never soiled or bloodied. Mary Ann is the virginal Girl Next Door -pretty as a daisy, fresh as laundry line-drying on a summer day, and fertile as the Kansas soil that she hails from. Ginger is the encapsulation of American desire. Like Joan Harris née Holloway of Mad Men, she is not blond, but essentially a stand in for America’s fetish for blonds. Ginger is as obvious as an flesh-colored orchid. Mary Ann and Ginger could be a two-faced goddess that could be named Madonna-Whore.

These all face off against the great demon Gilligan, who is trickster, destroyer, and adolescent priapism -he is the baby boomer in early adolescence ready to terrorize his parents and peers. If the censors had not been in the way, Gilligan’s Island in the second season would have seen Mary Ann and Ginger, both pregnant, foraging for clams while Gilligan sipped coconut juice from the Professor’s skull, using the Skipper as his living chair, wearing a vest made from the Millionaire. Lovey would have been the main course in the season one finale. There are no people of color on this show, but Gilligan’s shirt is red, which is a marker, a red flag. For along with being the trickster, destroyer, and phallus rampant, Gilligan is the Other. At best, he is the troublesome minority who amuses with minstrelsy, but at worst, he will come and take your women.

And why would we worship at the altars of such as these? We already do, because each of these characters is a demographic group that consumes and drives the economy. Each of these characters has a store at the mall. Each of these characters has a magazine, a channel on cable, and political candidate shaped for them.

When I tried to explain this to my 10 year old, he said this, “It’s a stupid tv show that makes no sense and is frustrating because of that idiot Gilligan.” Such an innocent. He has so much liberal arts education to learn!

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Birthday GIfts for a Narcissist

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Birthday Gifts for a Narcissist

 

It’s birthday season for a particular gifted and talented young man in your life. The only problem is that he’s a terrible narcissist and you don’t want to encourage that particular aspect of his personality. Then again, he seems to like it when you bring it up, and you suspect it’s because it gives him an avenue to talk about himself. Well, this year, you have the opportunity to start a dialogue, starting with a simple gift.

It could be a just a 3-pack of pocket sized, ruled Moleskine notebooks in standard black. This way, the birthday boy can jot down important paradigm shifting thoughts. The problem with having an enormous intellect is the interface between it and the world, and for birthday boy, scratching down ideas for improving work flow around himself, patents for marvelous inventions for making his life and yours easier, and whole speeches to be given to the world. After all, if you make life easier for the narcissist, you really are making life easier for yourself, he figures, because his best interests should also be yours. That is the crux of the problem -the narcissist doesn’t know where he ends and the world begins.

If your narcissist isn’t a writer, a fitting gift is anything from the Orvis catalog. I suggest a snug pair of driving moccasins which cushion his soles like his mama’s hands wrapped around his tiny baby feet. Or a pair of shorts with a repeating embroidered pattern of a rising brook trout. Or a monogrammed over and under 12 gauge shotgun handmade in Italy with a choice of ivy patterns. Orvis is what happens when L.L. Bean kicks out all of their insufferable narcissists and they decided to form a better, cozier company just for themselves.

If you have any talent in the arts, a gift of your work might suit a narcissist well. I suggest an ironic oil painting of your birthday boy as the Dear Leader, one hand outstretched palm up to represent giving, the other on his waist with thumb down to represent humility, giving a thoughtful lecture about world peace to a gathered crowd of people who all look on with rapture and ecstasy. If you have the talent, but not the time, a quick study with chalk would be fine with birthday boy posed as St. Sebastian, but remember to seal it because chalk is messy.

If your talents are in the crafts, might I suggest a diorama. Suitably ironic statements about your subject’s narcissism would be a tableau depicting Little Bighorn, with your birthday boy as General Custer, and all of the people in his life as the Sioux. How about the back stabbing scene from Julius Caesar with your narcissist as the man who would save Rome. A manger!

And finally, there are services on the internet designed for the narcissist. No, I’m not talking about Twitter, or even Facebook -it’s not 2009 for goodness sake! You can send in a picture of your beloved narcissist and there are companies that will fashion action figures complete with appropriate, tasteful wardrobes and useful accessories. You can chose between the small minifigures and larger, GI Joe scale action figures (not dolls!). You can also order bobble head figures. When I last looked into this, it’s much cheaper to order in bulk, so a group of friends can go in together on this gift in such a way that they themselves would receive the gift of a bobble head of their narcissist friend at an appropriate remove from the birthday -Christmas let’s say.

Of course, if you are pressed for time, you can always order an engraved iPad. I suggest the white 64 gB version with 4G LTE from Verizon engraved with, “To you, from me.”