Jacob took the kids to his dad’s house in Maryland last week, which is conveniently located a mile from their favorite restaurant, Chipotle (lol). I joined them a few days later on a quite-delayed Amtrak. When I got there, I saw that their bedroom for the week was on a deluxe blow-up mattress in his dad’s office, which had a giant TV in it. That TV had Roku, which also had Youtube Kids. This was deemed glorious because they could both wake up and watch TV without moving their bodies, often for multiple hours on end, and because the time when they used to have Youtube Kids is the time they are most nostalgic for.
“Remember when we used to have Youtube on the iPad?,” Julian asks me at least once a day for the last six months. This is followed by….absolutely nothing. Longing stares. He just wants me to think about this great time of the past and for me to absorb that I took this happiness away from him.
Ada often asks me to google things like, “Seashells and ocean and gems in resin” or ‘earrings shaped like gummy bears multicolored resin.” Usually the results come up with products sold at Temu, Amazon, or Walmart. We then have to have a recurring discussion about how Google shopping results are intentionally trying to target you to buy cheap, disposable goods, which is my reductive explanation for why we’re trying not to shop there. Occasionally we talk about billionaires, workers not being treated right, some loose definition of overconsumption, and so on, but the stares are increasingly distant, so I keep it succinct. I get some blank nods, but then hear Ada over-confidently lecturing her friends about how the internet tries to trick you into buying stuff and billionaires are the worst.
I pat myself on the back.
When I ask her if these crafts are something she is making at camp, she’s like: “No, it’s from back when we had Youtube.” Like: more than a year ago. There is apparently a lot of memorable resin content.
Given the newfound access to Youtube at their grandparents house for one blissful week, there’s an endless fount of new Google requests.
“Google Van Gogh’s least famous painting,” says Julian, followed by, “What is the bomb that exploded that was the least destructive?”
After he considers this he follows with, “Most valuable Pokemon card ever are there only two and do I have one of them.” We have the recurring discussion about how Google doesn’t know what Pokemon cards he has and there’s a pause followed by, “Ok, can you ask if ancient money is worth more than new money.”
Ada is fighting for a turn—and her requests introduce a new flavor. “Search for epoxy resin beach statue.” I do, regrettably. “Now, wave party decorations.” She then moves into a category that I also would have loved—which is room makeovers—inspired by one of the Youtube themes she loves best: parents surprising their children with a themed bedroom makeover.
“Do room makeover jungle canopy fake plants.” This is followed by “giant neon cactus” and “Hanging jellyfish lanterns top bunk bed.” She takes a lot of screenshots so I won’t forget.
Unsurprisingly, all of Julian’s searches lead to the bowels of Reddit and all of Ada’s lead to big box stores. Results of course beget more results because this is how the Internet works. Like if you thought you wanted an epoxy resin beach statue, then maybe you also want a mermaid shaped yard fountain. Maybe you also want resin sea turtle night light! Maybe you also want a sculpture of a leaping family of dolphins frozen in mid-air! Ada wants it all.
I tell them these searches are depressing me and we need to go do something else. The something else we do is go to the pool. They refuse every offer to go to a museum or any other suggestion and are exclusively focused on the pool. It’s 95 degrees most of the week, so this is fine with me, and the public pool that happens to be nearby is a gloriously resourced pool with waterslides, a lazy river, and an olympic size main pool.
At the pool they are mostly peaceful but are also constantly demanding snacks and fighting over my body. Everyone wants me to look at them all the time. Watch my jump. Watch my dive. Watch my spin. Watch me swim four feet repeatedly until your eyes glaze over. Throw me. Dunk me. Spin me. Pull me around the pool. I relish the 15 minute adult swim even though i’m swimming laps in toddler-sized goggles. We stay at the pool for 4-5 hours a day until everyone is exhausted and depleted from the sun.
When we get back everyone’s hair is sticky and matted and the kids are trying to convince me that the pool is like taking a shower, “basically.” It’s not, as we all know. But after we get through the real showers I let them return to their air conditioned room with the TV and fine: Youtube.
“You know what?,” says Julian. “Can I tell you something?”
“You can,” I say, for the 300th time that day, trying to finally, actually, read my book.
“The only thing better than Youtube in the morning is Youtube after swimming. It’s just so relaxing.”
He might be right.
Recommendations:
To watch: Went to see Janet Planet last night, the new A24 film by Pulitzer prize winning playwright, Annie Baker, a quiet, meditative, and theatrical ode to mother-daughterhood, summer, boredom, and imperfection. If you liked Aftersun—also an A24 single parent/11 year old child tale—this film shares some notes.
To listen: Relatedly, I wasn’t familiar with Baker’s work before, and her interview on Talk Easy was a great intro. Also like how she challenges the form and assumptions of the interviewee.
To watch: I’m watching Wimbledon (go Alcaraz!) and Jacob watches the Tour de France and for one summer, our kids think we’re intense sports fans. We haven’t even gotten to the Paris Olympics! (The Tour de France is truly the most insane sports competition and the Netflix show, Unchained: Tour de France is entirely worth watching to understand how it works.).
To read: Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck. Wow. What a tour de force of a writer and a book. Long Island Compromise, the new novel out yesterday from Taffy Brodesser-Akner is in my queue.
To read: The Times’ list of 100 Best Books of the 21st Century. Smart use of an interactive feature and a great way to select related books. Surprised by some of the titles aren’t we always on lists like these.
To listen: Molly Baz has Confidence in Her Taste on the Sporkful podcast. Love a journey-through-food-career story.
To read: Michelle Zauner on Rediscovering Her Own Version of Korea. Props to learning another language in your mid-thirties. Excited to read her second book about the experience.
To make: Roasted cabbage caesar salad with chickpeas (NYT Cooking Gift Link) Roasted cabbage is under-appreciated!
Hats for kids: We've doubled up on summer hats because SUN and outdoor camps. These extremely cute designs from Twill & Pine are great five-panel hats: washable, fit great, and have an adjustable back.
Rec of the week: What do you cook when it’s this hot out. Send me your hot weather recipes.
BLTs!
Always love these dispatches. I am frankly so afraid of our kid discovering google/the internet/everything, really.