Friday, September 9, 2011

Trailers and Tiaras

Some of you may be familiar with the show Toddlers and Tiaras. It is currently my favorite new obsession. You start out watching in horror, the car wreck you can't turn away from, and 40 minutes later you are on the edge of your couch crossing your fingers that "Queen" (an actual childs name on the show) will get the Ultimate Grand Supreme.  It is a fascinating look into this mostly white southern sub-culture.  The costumes alone are enough to get me to watch, but combined with the meltdowns, tantrums, and desperate mothers/gay fathers taking second mortgages out on their homes to afford those glitz costumes and flippers (fake teeth that the girls where) I wonder why people even bother with the Jersey Shore and the Bachelor.  Watching an episode of T and T is like watching Sixteen and Pregnant (the early years). Before all the mothers are like "I thought i did everything right by giving her birth control and letting her boyfriend live with us? Were did i go wrong?" 

Surprisingly most of these contestants don't actually live in trailers.  Because pageanting is expensive, like one dress can cost in the 1,000 to 3,000 dollar range. Now not all of the girls where dresses that expensive. But trust me if you want to be pulling those grand supreme titles you better.  Hence it's mostly beaten down men who have really good jobs, that are too scared of their wives to say no to shelling out this kind of cash to dress their daughters like showgirls.  But there are real nuggets of wisdom in this show.  Like one pageant coach tells her four year old charge that she should like nerds, because nerds make a lot of  money and that is who you want to marry. 

These are the times of stories that we should be learning as young girls. I would have much rather learned this lesson as a four year old than that of prince charming coming to save me and now having false expectations permeating all of my relationships.  If only my mother had been shelling out money hourly for me to learn the valuable lesson of liking nerds cuz they make more money, high school would have been very different for me.  But it is too late, i am already hardwired for prince charming and not for the Bill Gates and Steve Jobs of this world.  See all you haters Toddlers and Tiara is not all bad.

For the most perfect depiction of Trailers and Tiara's everyone please go by the movie "Drop Dead Gorgeous". Where my favorite line from the movie is when mothers tells daughter "If they ask you to take your top off make sure you get the money first, and go get my smokes!"  Wiser words have never been spoken.

No comments:

Post a Comment