Can’t See the Beauty For the Mess
Today’s For Better or For Worse is a new-run and is also a repeat of a common theme for the strip, i.e. Dad and/or children have fun and leave a mess for Elly to clean up. In today’s version of the story, it is particularly poignant, because the participants create very nice paper snowflakes. Whether Elly ever sees them or not, I do not know; because the joke stops with Elly seeing their mess. The subtext is that Elly never gets to see the beauty created by her family because her obsession with messes and cleaning gets in the way.
I am reminded of a quote attributed to the late, great American composer Charles Ives, which was something like: “If you listen too closely to the notes, you may miss the music.” Or the classic “She can’t see the trees for the forest.” As a parent, it is one of the struggles in life. It takes a certain amount of cleaning to keep it up where you live. On the other hand, is spending so much time cleaning your house worth the loss of time you have with your kids? This is particularly important to me because I work during the week, and most of my time with my kids is a few scant hours during the evenings and the time during the weekends. This Saturday, I drove the kids to the Arizona State Grade Chess Championships in Mesa, Arizona (a 105-minute drive), where they played 5 games separated by 1:45 between each match. We then had supper with the chess team from their school and drove back home and were back by about 10:45 pm. Number of hours of cleaning = 0. But the number of hours seeing how my kids did in their chess competitions was much higher.
I am reminded of a quote attributed to the late, great American composer Charles Ives, which was something like: “If you listen too closely to the notes, you may miss the music.” Or the classic “She can’t see the trees for the forest.” As a parent, it is one of the struggles in life. It takes a certain amount of cleaning to keep it up where you live. On the other hand, is spending so much time cleaning your house worth the loss of time you have with your kids? This is particularly important to me because I work during the week, and most of my time with my kids is a few scant hours during the evenings and the time during the weekends. This Saturday, I drove the kids to the Arizona State Grade Chess Championships in Mesa, Arizona (a 105-minute drive), where they played 5 games separated by 1:45 between each match. We then had supper with the chess team from their school and drove back home and were back by about 10:45 pm. Number of hours of cleaning = 0. But the number of hours seeing how my kids did in their chess competitions was much higher.
posted by howard at 11:33 PM
10 Comments:
howard,
The subtext is that Elly never gets to see the beauty created by her family because her obsession with messes and cleaning gets in the way.
It's a subtext that Lynn allows Elly to acknowledge once every few months or so. Deep down, Elly knows that she's wasted her life being obsessed with minutiae but the temptation to do so is just too strong; she's pretty much Funky Winkerbean in a skirt what an addiction to busywork. The sad part about her wish to do it over again is that she did not ask to be free of the sheet-shaving monkey on her back.
dreadedcandiru2,
The sad part about her wish to do it over again is that she did not ask to be free of the sheet-shaving monkey on her back.
Like many comic strip characters, aspects of their personality are considered to be points of humour for years or decades. Dagwood Bumstead is a glutton. Beetle Bailey is lazy. Elly Patterson is obsessed with housework. The contrast here though is that Dagwood Bumstead is not shown to miss out on his children's lives because he eats giant sandwiches. Beetle Bailey is not shown to be booted out of the army for being lazy (although Sarge does frequently give him a boot to the head). Because we see what Elly misses out on, it does take on a more tragic air, like Funky Winkerbean losing his wife due to his addiction. As with Funky Winkerbean, tragedy just isn't that funny. I look at Elly's overreaction to the mess and I think, "This would be so much better if Elly were cleaning this up while looking at the completed snowflakes, or after looking at the snowflakes with her children. Or getting her husband and children to clean it up and finding a whole mess they missed."
What's even more poignant about this strip is that it does show a loving, involved, hands-on parent - John. Lynn has spent almost the entire strip showing him off as the perfect dad...
...only to shoot him down in flames to emphasise Elly's martyrdom. Lynn's not just clueless, she's actively working against the concepts you describe. There's something awfully sad about that.
It really is sad that we see Elly's reaction as if making a mess crafting is a horrible thing. No, it's not. There is no reason for Elly to be shocked. It's normal, and Mike and John can certainly clean up what they did. Doing fun things often means having to clean up.
Wouldn't this have been better if it had continued after Mike at the door with Elly looking at the snowflakes and mess and saying to Mike (panel 1) "Wow, honey they're beautiful. And guess what? Because you made snowflakes, you get to learn a *second* thing, too" (panel 2) "... how to sweep paper off the floor." (handing him a broom)
Insert_Moniker_Here,
Wouldn't this have been better if it had continued after Mike at the door with Elly looking at the snowflakes and mess and saying to Mike (panel 1) "Wow, honey they're beautiful. And guess what? Because you made snowflakes, you get to learn a *second* thing, too" (panel 2) "... how to sweep paper off the floor." (handing him a broom).
That would make her a more tolerable domestic goddess: Marge Simpson. Marge likes to tidy up too but she also like to share the love, so to speak. That's because she isn't a martyrdom junkie.
howard, shoebox2,
No, this isn't especially funny; Elly looks as if she's got a serious mental problem here. The sad part of knowing the future is knowing that her inability to see the good in anything made Mike, Liz and April warped to one degree or another. They act in the odd way they do because their primary caregiver needed a checkup from the neck up.
shoebox2,
What's even more poignant about this strip is that it does show a loving, involved, hands-on parent - John. Lynn has spent almost the entire strip showing him off as the perfect dad...
...only to shoot him down in flames to emphasise Elly's martyrdom.
There are multiple occasions for this over the years. John loads the dishwasher, but loads it wrong. John folds the clothes, but folds them wrong. It’s like watching those commercials for any kind of domestic activity, where the husband is a gross incompetent for laughs. Look! John can’t even play with the kids right! What a boob!
InsertMonikerHere
Wouldn't this have been better if it had continued after Mike at the door with Elly looking at the snowflakes and mess and saying to Mike (panel 1) "Wow, honey they're beautiful. And guess what? Because you made snowflakes, you get to learn a *second* thing, too" (panel 2) "... how to sweep paper off the floor." (handing him a broom)
Then in panel 3, as he is cleaning he thinks, “Star-making leaves things in a di-star-ray.”
DreadedCandiru2,
That would make her a more tolerable domestic goddess: Marge Simpson. Marge likes to tidy up too but she also like to share the love, so to speak. That's because she isn't a martyrdom junkie.
Yes, but Marge does have her trademark sigh to make it all worthwhile.
Then in panel 3, as he is cleaning he thinks, “Star-making leaves things in a di-star-ray.”
Howard, by now I'd take lame wordplay over this Fifth Ring of Suburban Hell.
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