All I really needed to know about fatherhood I learned in Evil Dead 2
Any rational discussion of parenthood - at least from the male side - must begin with an exegesis of Evil Dead 2. Why? Because each of us, as a new father, is a direct analogue to Ash.
To illustrate:
- Expectations are irrelevant
Everyone walks into fatherhood with a loose set of expectations that, almost immediately, are blown completely out of the water — much in the same way that Ash heads into the woods for a weekend of fun with his girlfriend, only to abruptly descend into a nightmarish zombie bloodbath. The parallels are uncanny. - Not all textbooks may work to your benefit
I don't know about you, but before our kids showed up we put a fair amount of time and effort into building a big kid library — half of 'em pregnancy books, half of 'em new kid owner manuals. Spock, Sears, American Academy of Pediatrics, f@#$ing Baby Whisperers... we had them all, and at one time or another consulted each and every one. In retrospect, it's clear that most of them did little other than to aggravate and/or terrify us... when it comes to answering the question of "what do these symptoms mean?" they were only slightly less horrifying than a trip down Google Lane. By the same token, what do Ash and girlfriend find when they get to the cabin in the woods? The Book of the Dead. And then they play a reel-to-reel tape of somebody translating it... and then all hell (literally) breaks loose. The lesson here: reading is bad.
No matter how well you know and/or get along with your partner... things change when the kid shows up. First off, you immediately get knocked a notch (or two, or more... it depends on how many kids show up) down the priority list. In fact, you should probably face up to the fact that you're going to get knocked off the priority list altogether. Secondly, you remember all that time you spent together doing fun couple things? Yeah, that's gone. You are no longer a couple: you're a mobile baby-support unit. All those post-Frank the Tank pretty nice little Saturdays at Home Depot... buying some wallpaper, maybe some flooring? Maybe going to Bed, Bath & Beyond, if you have enough time? Those now require hours of prep time: arming yourselves with diaper bags heavier and more fully-stocked than the bags Lewis & Clark used on their transcontinental expedition. Just like Ash, whose expectation of a romantic weekend with girlfriend Linda leads to her being 1) dragged out of the house by evil spirits; 2) possessed by demons; 3) beating the crap out of Ash; 4) getting decapitated by a shovel-wielding Ash; and 5) being buried in the back yard by Ash like a hamster. (A dead hamster. I feel it important to clarify that point.)
Obviously, pregnancy and childbirth do absurd things to the human body — but these things happen primarily to the female body, and as such don't affect the male of the species much beyond an exponentially-increased need to look sympathetic a lot of the time and generally avoid saying stupid things. But once the little mammal in question arrives, the burden is shared... and the impact is significant. Constant lifting, carrying, stress and sleep deprivation combine to generate a physical, psychological and emotional toll the likes of which are generally frowned upon by the Geneva Convention. Just like Ash, whose hand is possessed by demons and proceeds to beat him senseless... until he is finally forced to trap it in a vice and hack it off with a chainsaw.
Dealing with a new kid is a constant exercise in mental and physical dexterity. Chances are you'll have a buttload of kid tools at your disposal... but every day, you'll find yourself needing something you either don't have or can't find. This is where the real challenge lies: your success is largely contingent on your ability to improvise and repurpose something intended for one thing - say, straining pasta - into something different and babycentric (e.g. a bathing receptacle for newborns). Witness Ash putting this principle to work in the following clip:
Unless you work in healthcare, chances are that your everyday life doesn't bring you into close, intimate contact with the inner workings of the human body — especially in terms of the rich and colorful variety of disgusting things it can spew from all orifices. That's the joy of kids: you get to discover all of this firsthand. Constantly. In fact, you quickly discover that days when you're not covered in another human being's feces, urine and/or vomit occur with the same relative frequency as solar eclipses. This innate truth of parenthood is paralleled by the part of the movie where... well, okay: by pretty much the entire movie.
Unless you're a much better person than I am (which, realistically, is a pretty safe bet) chances are you're gonna need some help to navigate the first year or so of your kid's life. Chances are that most of this is going to happen as a product of active collaboration between you and your spouse/partner/monkey butlers. But there's only so far that's gonna take you... sooner or later (probably sooner), you're both gonna hit a wall. That's where the team approach comes into play. It's like basketball: driving to the hoop may work once in a while, but sooner or later you're gonna have to learn to pass - and learn to be ready for the pass yourself - if you're gonna succeed. The more people you can drag into your downward spiral of new parenthood bring onto your team, the better off you & the kid will be. In short: on days when you suck, it's good to have backup — much in the same way that Ash can't fight off the forces of darkness himself: he has to enlist the help of three others to beat off the demons (that's right: I just typed "beat off the demons") and prevent the apocalypse. Of course, all three of them die in disgusting and violent ways... but hopefully, you'll have better luck with your support team.
This is, of course, just the briefest of summaries — one could easily produce untold volumes of analysis on the metaphorical applications of the lessons of Evil Dead 2 to the challenges and wonder of new fatherhood. But let this serve, at the very least, as a starting point for discussion and study.
Posted by TwoBusy on March 26, 2009 |
