Reading the labels

I was watching Starting Over the other day - you know, five women are picked to live in a house with life coaches and work through issues that would be dealt with at my house with either Chardonnay or Ben & Jerry's - and I was disturbed by the repeated use of labels. (I understand you being disturbed at my admission of watching Starting Over to begin with, but that's a topic for an entirely separate post).

"I was raised by a bipolar mother." I was immediately taken aback by the finality of this statement; it was as if this term alone defined the individual to whom she was referring. Forget that Mom nurtured contest-winning tomatoes in a backyard garden, taught her to ski when Dad deemed it too dangerous, and hand-sewed sequins on a dress until 2 am so her daughter would feel special for her first prom. But the label is all we will ever know of her.

Read any articles about the death of Pat Morita? It was apparently the booze that killed him, you know, a fact to which the authors devoted 3/4 of the article that I read. For my Canadian readers, I'm pretty sure he was an actor, as well - something about Wax on, Wax off? I wonder if People magazine would have focused on his Wendy's Single with Cheese and Starbucks Frappacino (with whip!) consumption should the cause of death been heart disease.

Less embarrassing is my obsession with true crime, a genre that tends to fall into the very same quicksand. Victims are strippers or drug addicts or otherwise undesirable. If they are PTA Moms, you hear about it down to the very last detail - how they made snow cones from actual atmospheric precipitation and subbed on occasion for Mother Theresa at the orphanage. Women who shop at Talbots should never be the victims of violent crimes.

Bigot. ADHD. Hysterical. I wonder if this makes us feel better somehow. Hateful. Schizophrenic. Disturbed. Assigning labels to others allows us to place people into categories of which we would never be a part.

I regret casting out a college friend based on high-school perceptions of her. I went through a stage of adolescent rage toward my mother in which I said things I still wish I could take back. And yes, I even have 1989 photo documentation of myself wearing a Coca-Cola sweatshirt out in public. I'd hate for some of my lesser moments to define me on a headstone or on a reality show in the future.