Pizza and a Movie

Two weeks ago I instituted Friday night pizza and movie night at home. That night I made pizza crust in the afternoon, and we ate pizza and watched "Dolphin Tale" about a dolphin that gets her tail wrapped in a crab trap line, has her tail amputated, and receives a prosthetic tail. Noah loved it all, food and film. Then we discovered that the dolphin featured in the movie, "Winter," actually lives in a marine aquarium about 20 minutes from where we'll be staying on our Florida vacation in April, so Noah is ecstatic. The best part of the film was being able to watch Noah across the room, every emotion showing on his face as he experienced moments of tragedy, joy, and peaceful fulfillment. Even when he hid his face with his hands I saw he was riveted.

After watching "Dolphin Tale" I became pretty concerned about this new tradition. While I adore movies, finding ones we deem appropriate and harmless for Noah is not easy, and I was not confident I would find anything else that did not involve talking dogs or modern adult male comedians trying unsuccessfully to become the newest Stooge. The breakneck pace and violent or sexualized humor in most animated movies is also not what I want Noah watching at 5-years-old ("Ponyo" was a great recent exception that we saw a year ago or so). "Bambi" was hard enough with his mom dying, but at least it happened off camera. I was horrified when we stumbled into an evening last year that involved the movie "Up" in which there was more hand-to-hand combat fighting than a lot of war films I've seen. Yes, the balloons were a stunning effect, but I thought "Die Hard" was more relaxing an action film.

So last week I scoured the family videos in our local store, wholly unsure of what else I might find. Because Noah loves nature, I gratefully scooped up Disney's "African Cats" and "Arctic Tale," two documentary-style, narrated films focusing on animal families and their wild lives. They too were emotional for us to watch, as animal mothers struggled to help their babies survive the perils of predators and changes in habitat. And animal fathers were ousted, did battle with each other for dominance, and generally either stood aside or attacked their children. I cringed across the room as Noah calmly and lovingly accepted the lessons about the cycle of life, the food chain and the rules of survival in the natural world.

And it's Friday again. This morning I asked Noah what kind of movie he would like to watch tonight, thinking I would have to start getting the classic musicals like "Mary Poppins" and feeling once again like this whole parenting thing is fraught, fraught! "Non-fiction," he said without hesitation. "I want more non-fiction about animals. Ocean animals, this time."

Even in these small ways, this little creating of a joyful and fun weekly tradition, parenting takes me into the deep of my own fears every day. How much information about the culture and world is enough? What is too much? At 5, what can Noah handle? A colleague and friend used to ask me about Noah by saying, "How's the man-cub?" It's all right there all the time, the boy and the future man. Like the cheetah and polar bear mothers, I want Noah to understand about the world, while also being safe to develop what it will take to thrive in it.