MTValhalla

July 28, 2005

MTV Europe. A small German boy can see all the way to California. His scrotum feels funny when he watches the nubile blonde women in her kitchen. He doesn’t speak English but there are subtitles.
Someone forgot to shop for her. When she came home from shopping for new place settings there was no food in the fridge. Not NO food but just not the right food. She thought she wanted to cook a meal. She didn’t know how to cook. The stove was top of the line. It was the type of stainless steel massive appliance you see in the best restaurants in big cities. Her “baby” bought her this kitchen. He is a rich musician. When they moved into the house the kitchen was beautiful but it wasn’t theirs. A kitchen is a personal thing so they had someone tear all the other stainless steel stuff out and they put in stainless steel things that they picked out themselves. She was thinking of cooking for the family so she got out a cookbook. Food should be like it is in those pictures. Life should be like it is in those pictures. The ideal is captured. There were a lot of flat-screen LCD TV’s. Big ones on the walls of every room. When she wanted to discipline the child she turned one off. Simple. The child was well loved and never a burden because at just the moment when she put up a fuss she could be handed off to a nanny who knew what to do about it. The cameras follow them all the time. In a 24-hour period there is nothing interesting that happens. There is not enough colouring outside the lines. Sidebar: for the little German boy is not old enough to understand the irony of the massively wealthy punk rocker. Outrageousness has given way to impulsive consumption. Punk rockers have left the squats and harnessed their energy to build lightships on the hills of the gated communities. In tinted Land Rovers they slide out of the compound. The exhaust smells of mango or jasmine. They arrive at the $2500 a day studio and with every extra overdub and digital edit they move closer to the ubermusic that is scientifically tuned to the frequency of a 12 year-old’s crocodile brain. Their concentration is intense for a 2 full hours. It goes “bigger” in the chorus. The mannish boy becomes hungry. His trophy bride is at home staring at the stove. Her career is on hold for the kids but she fills her days with “things”. Where does the time go? Can we watch that movie again? She does not ask her friends about their problems. She has problems of her own. The cameras are waiting for her problems. If there are no problems she talks about minor pitfalls as if they were problems. Kindness to others makes her feel good. In that way she thinks about herself. There is no outside world when the cameras are on. Working out can solve a lot of problems. The kids have someone to watch them if both parents decide to work out at the same time. They have their own gym and their own pool but they prefer to go to a health club. The personal trainer can provide motivation if motivation is lacking. Can she use soy milk in this dish? What is that clicking sound when the element fires up? Its scary. She needs to call his cell phone because she is scared of the clicking. Is there something wrong with the stove? Its getting too late to cook this meal before he arrives home from the studio. She asks the nanny to order something from the place she and her husband ate at on their first date. She needs to go upstairs for a steam. She puts on a slinky piece she bought a month ago and forgot about. It makes her feel good. The cameras sparkle back at her. He’ll be so impressed that she did something this nice for him. They eat dinner and mumble terms of endearment that are all variations on “baby” and “baby doll”. The cameras follow them to the bedroom and fade to black over giggling.
The little German boy turns the channel to a show about goats. He smiles and wishes he had a goat. His mother has returned from work with that same cough. He misses his father. He will make her the dinner he knows how to make on nights when she works late. His mother will go to the bathroom to wash the smell from the fish plant off her skin. She uses a special shampoo with natural lemon in it. If they had a yard he would definitely try to have a goat. Goats have personality and they give something back to you.

Back on MTV: The couple haven’t actually touched each other in private for seven months. They are divorced by the next year. He pairs up with someone who looks like her and she with someone who looks like him. They move to new haciendas and villas. The children grow and watch more TV. One is, “very interested in computers” they say when someone asks what the kids are into. Sometimes they feel lost but they don’t know exactly why. She thinks about recycling and what her efforts will do for the environment. He is still all about his music.
Their eldest child has a dream one night. She dreams she is on a farm. There is a steel gray sky and a boy who speaks a different language is trying to show her how to feed a goat without getting bitten. They laugh because the goat’s tongue feels strange. When she wakes up she feels happy. Her mom tells her she can have a goat if she really wants one. She says, “No thank you. A goat wouldn’t be happy here.”