Soap Operas

When I was a little girl, I remember my Grandma making time every day to watch her “stories” – I think she watched “Guiding Light” and “Days of Our Lives”. Then, when I was in grammar and high school, I rushed home from school to watch ABC’s “General Hospital” and at that time, there was also a cult soap on after GH called “Dark Shadows” that I tried to never miss!!! After high school, I worked 2nd shift for several years and got hooked on ALL the ABC soaps – “All My Children”, “One Life To Live”, and “General Hospital” – and for a while, “Ryan’s Hope” was on before AMC……. When I moved to NC, I mostly worked first shift (except for a short stint on third shift in the early days at Wyeth), so I parred it down to just my two favorites and set the recorder every day for AMC and OLTL. I got my Mom hooked on AMC and OLTL, but then realized I was wasting way too much time skimming through the tape every evening, so I stopped COLD TURKEY! Mom would talk to me about them and when I visited her, I would catch up a little on them, but really did get out of the loop. Then, one day, I decided to get back into it – but only AMC. So, for the past few years, I have taped AMC and watch it when I can – sometimes I scan through several episodes at a time on the weekends.

The point to the first paragraph was to point out that I am somewhat of an EXPERT on Soap Operas – I have at least 40 years direct experience and even more if you count sitting with my Grandma watching HER “stories”.

So — now that I have stated my credentials, here are my “expert opinions” of soap operas!!!!

What I like about Soaps:

• I like to get involved in the character’s lives
• It is a pleasure to see someone else making more of a train wreck out of their lives than I do – without it being a real person who has to really suffer because of it
• The men are AMAZING – they are good looking, they are sensitive, they are caring, they are good looking, they are almost always rich, they look great with their shirts off, they can do anything, they are HUNKS, they hold their own in a actual conversations, did I say they are good looking?????
• The women are AMAZING – they are strong powerful women, they can take an idea and within a couple of episodes have a fully functioning and thriving business that made them overnight millionaires, they can get away with murder, they rarely have to work but have everything they could possibly want in life!!!!!
• The kids are AMAZING – they literally grow up overnight, they rarely go through the “terrible two’s”, they are always well behaved (until they reach puberty)
• If I get behind on the tapes and don’t have time to really catch up, it is OK – as long as you catch Fridays and Mondays, you can pretty much know the important stuff that’s going on!

My Pet Peeves About Soaps:

• Everyone is always jumping in bed with people they barely know or that are married to a good friend or family member
• No one knows how to keep their mouth shut — if there is a secret that will ruin some one’s life, you can bet the person who shouldn’t find out will over hear it being talked about in a public place!
• If two people need to talk “in private”, they go about 2 feet away from everyone else and talk in a normal volume voice
• Everyone is always hanging out at the hospital and they just stand around in the way while the doctors are trying to do their jobs or when someone is in what should be a private moment!
• People just walk in other people’s houses like they live there and whether the people are home or not
• Doesn’t anyone on a soap WORK for a living?????
• When an actor wants out of their contract to do other things, one of two things happen to the character: 1) they die, but their body is not found – which, of course means they will be back someday with some bazaar story about amnesia OR 2) they suddenly look totally different (because the actor is replaced with another actor)
• Death is NOT forever — no matter how someone dies, no matter who witnesses it, and regardless of whether or not the world watches them get buried — someday, maybe years later, they WILL be back!!!!
• Totally betray a friend or loved one? Irrevocably destroy some one’s life? That’s OK – they will forgive you and you’ll be closer than ever at some point!!!

I wrote this while watching the tape of today’s AMC — I love my soap!!!!