Tori and Dean: To Have The Issues They Have

Last year I started watching a show called Tori and Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood, which is a reality show starring, as the name suggests, Tori Spelling and Dean McDermott. I am rather ashamed to admit that I have been sucked in. It is like a train wreck; I know I should look away, but I keep watching to see how bad it really is. I am conflicted because I have a host of issues with both Tori and Dean, mainly that they had an affair with each other when they were both married to other people, and also with the especially insensitive way Dean dealt with the aftermath. My feelings are that the mistress who marries the man creates a job opening. Their morals, or lack thereof, is a topic for another time, though.

The truth is that it is not so much that I like their show or find them particularly interesting, but rather that it consistently baffles me that the issues they view as problems are problems most of us would kill to have, like how to juggle the variety of television and movie roles they have been offered. Equally baffling is the way they react and whine (there is no better word for it) about the times when they actually have to raise and be responsible for their own children. Admittedly, by Hollywood standards they do not receive as much in-home help as other celebrities (and no, I don't consider either Tori or Dean a celebrity in the truest sense of the word). However, by the standards most mothers would apply, they both receive an incredible amount of help from friends, a hired baby-nurse (aka nanny), and others who arrange their schedules and care for their children when they can't be bothered to make those arrangements themselves like the rest of us.

So, I am watching last night and their baby nurse (who seems like a really lovely lady) is out of town visiting her own family. During her absence Tori decides to take the two kids to visit their father on set of a photo shoot. This task about kills her and it looks like the most unnatural thing in the world for her to do. She acts like she has just brokered world peace for simply being able to dress two kids, load them in a car, drive them, unload them, strap them in a stroller, and then supervise them once out in public. I have two kids. Running errands is not always easy and sometimes it is downright miserable, but it is something every mom I know does on a daily basis and not one of us acts like we deserve a medal.

Also in last nights episode they had to plan, pack, and load for a trip to Canada. You can tell this is something that they rarely do for themselves. The sheer shock Tori expresses at the amount of stuff she has to pack for her children is telling. I am in complete agreement that packing for children should be an Olympic event. Not much is left behind and it can be a pain in the rear, but people have been doing it since the beginning of time and I don't know anyone who has died from it yet.

There's not any "lesson" or "moral" to this story, other than to say that I find their show entertaining primarily because the "issues" that so consume them are part of the average person's everyday life.

**Disclaimer: I will say, in their defense, that both parents seem to love their children very much, treat them nicely, and for the most part are pretty involved. I don't think they are neglectful, abusive, or anything of that nature.