Why Britt Westbourne is no Bobbie Spencer (or Monica Quartermaine)

General Hospital head writer Ron Carlivati is a longtime fan of the show who has done an amazing job turning the program around from a dark, mob-centric hour of violence and misogyny into a fun, relationship-centered, history-respective party of soapy goodness. Sadly, he’s not perfect – although in some episodes he does get close – and never are the faults more glaring than when Dr. Britt Westbourne is on screen. Her latest machinations have had some comparing her to 1978-79 Bobbie Spencer, who pulled similar ploys in her one-sided war against Laura Webber. Similarities could also been seen in some of the tricks Monica Webber pulled in trying to win Rick Webber away from Laura’s mother Lesley. But these comparisons fall flat when a true examination of these characters is done. To recap:

Bobbie Spencer was introduced in 1978, a bubbly student nurse at General Hospital. She immediately became friends with Laura, a high school student who was dating law school student Scotty Baldwin. Laura set up Bobbie with Scotty’s roommate Darren, and they became a couple. Meanwhile, Laura broke up with Scotty and ended up in a tawdry affair with her father’s college best friend, David Hamilton. Bobbie dumped Darren for Scotty. Laura ended up killing David, although her mother Lesley was arrested for the crime and confessed to killing David in self-defense to protect Laura. Laura had blocked the killing from her memory, and when she finally remembered, she ran away to New York City. Scotty found her and saved her from an evil pimp. Shortly thereafter, he broke up with Bobbie and got back together with Laura.

Bobbie was furious. She saw Laura as a privileged princess who had literally gotten away with murder and didn’t deserve Scotty’s love. At the same time, Bobbie had problems of her own. Her history of prostitution was revealed (to the audience, not to other characters), and she was being blackmailed by a former john. Yet she was an outstanding nurse, and she had real friendships with people who loved her, including her roommate Jessie Brewer and Jessie’s beau Dan Rooney. Her biggest flaw, aside from the torment she caused Laura, was that she wasn’t actually in love with Scotty – she saw the law student as a guarantee that she would never have to “go back to Elm Street.”

Monica Quartermaine, who played similar tricks on Lesley Webber in 1976-77, came from a similar background. Although she was never forced to prostitute herself, Monica had grown up in an orphanage as “the kid no one wanted.” Adopted as a teenager by Gail Baldwin, Monica was then forced to deal with the attentions of Gail’s husband, Greg. (story rewrites leave it murky whether their relationship was consensual or statutory or violent rape.) Rick was her first adult relationship (this was also changed in rewrites in 1992), and when he was presumed dead, she was so attached to his family that she married his younger brother Jeff rather than lose touch with Jeff and older sister Terry. When Rick returned from the dead, Monica’s immaturity, due to her lack of supportive, loving relationships as a child, left her incapable of dealing with the situation in an appropriate manner.

Compare these characters with Dr. Britt Westbourne, who….. exactly.

Sure, Patrick’s a good-looking man, but the audience has no clue exactly why Britt is so drawn to him that she would put her medical career in jeopardy to torment a woman she sees as a romantic rival. She has no back story, no friends, no family. She is a one-dimensional nothing.

And sadly, so is Sabrina, the student nurse that Britt has chosen to torment. Unlike Laura or Lesley, who were true romantic rivals and fully fleshed out characters who went head-to-head with Bobbie and Monica, Sabrina is … nice. She has friends, and an off-screen cousin who was a minor character on the show over ten years ago, but other than that, nothing. But everyone loves her and the audience is supposed to root for her because Britt is mean and we all know that eventually she’s going to take off her glasses and then wow! And let’s hope it’s a big wow, because right now Patrick seems more likely to adopt Sabrina than date her.

As this story eats up more and more airtime, it is imperative that viewers be given reasons for Britt’s behavior. The actress recently went on contract, and if she is to fill the huge shoes left by such villainesses as Bobbie, Monica, Heather, and Lucy (all who came from poor backgrounds and had well-established back stories), she cannot do it as a one-dimensional paper doll.

The irony is, of course, that Patrick’s wife Robin, who “died” in a lab explosion a year ago, is not dead at all. The audience knows she’s being held captive by uber-villain Jerry Jacks. So while all this is going on, the only emotionally satisfying conclusion will have both Britt and Sabrina out in the cold while Patrick welcomes his wife home.

BFF Day

Another Valentine’s Day has come and gone, as can be attested by the dead roses on the dining room table and the empty box of chocolates in the trash. My husband had always been good about getting me stuff on Valentine’s Day, although to be honest, it was a much bigger thrill to receive the deliveries when I was working in an office rather than at home. And I would have much more appreciated a dinner or movie out, rather than the usual weeknight evening of him working on his MBA coursework and me watching TV. Although there were new episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal on, so the evening wasn’t a total loss.

I think the only people who are really happy on Valentine’s Day are the women in new relationships with guys who try hard. When everything is fresh and new and there’s a cute guy in your doorway with one perfect rose in his hand and a tiny box wrapped in his pocket, unless there’s something really wrong with you, you’re going to have a magical night. For those of us who’ve been with our partners for a long time in working relationships, Valentine’s Day is just another night, albeit with candy. And it seems like single women have it the worst of all. They’re told every day of the year that they are “less than” without a man, and now here’s a whole industry in a day designed just to confirm that. And don’t get me started on all the single men who… oh, wait, never mind. Single men don’t give a rat’s ass that they’re single on Valentine’s Day. In fact, the TV show “The Middle” had a Valentine’s Day episode where older son Axel and his friends started a break-up service for people who didn’t want the drama of actually dumping their own girlfriend before Valentine’s Day. The premise, of course, was that men (or at least teenage boys) would rather be single than coupled on Valentine’s Day, so they didn’t have to deal with all the dinner/flowers/chocolate garbage. Oh, and not one girl used the service to break up with her boyfriend. Yes, it’s just a TV show, but my point is, no self-respecting man would ever wallow in self-pity about not being in a relationship on Valentine’s Day; no man is taught that he is “less than” without a woman. So why should women buy into that?

Maybe it’s because for centuries, women have been defined by their relationships in ways that men haven’t been since they stopped being referred to as “son of.” We are daughters, girlfriends, wives, mothers, divorcees, widows. Unless we’re single and have fabulous jobs, these titles define us much more than “writer,” “accountant,” “press secretary” or “investment banker.”

The day before Valentine’s Day, I started seeing on Facebook and Twitter posts related to “Galentine’s Day.” The posts were few and few between, but I gathered that the day before Valentine’s Day was supposed to be a day to celebrate female friendship. This is a great idea, and it deserves a lot more than a name and a placement that imply its function is to comfort women who don’t have a man to mark the next day.

Women, by and large, are the sentimental ones of the species, the ones who know and appreciate just how long it took to find just the right card, who love posting old photos on Facebook, who celebrate birthdays and other milestones. Most men are just not into all that.

So I propose a new holiday, one that celebrates friendship in all states – best friends, lifelong friends, office friends, mom friends. It’s not a consolation prize to Valentine’s Day; it deserves its own month. Maybe March; it’s still cold out and there’s nothing going on but college basketball. If you and your friends love college basketball, make a night out of it. There’d be parties for people who want to celebrate with all their friends, and restaurant specials for those who want some alone time with their bestie. Presents are welcome but not necessary. Although how can you resist getting your best friend that scarf you know would look just great with her favorite sweater?

So let’s pick a day in March and call it BFF Day. It’s not too early to start planning what you’d like to do to celebrate. And if anyone says, “Sounds fun but we can’t do it on a Saturday night, because that’s for my boyfriend,” you’re missing the point!

The Writer’s Juggling Act

Most writers I know are masters at procrastination. Even before Facebook and Twitter became giant time-sucks, there was always another article that needed to be read, other kinds of research, TV/movies we needed to keep up with because how could we write for the industry if we weren’t keeping an eye out on what Hollywood was producing? I justify all the Twitter time by telling myself that I’m just reading articles that I’d normally be reading in the newspaper or in a magazine anyway; it’s just a change of format. (I know I’m lying to myself. It’s okay.) Even with all that, I’ve been good about concentrating on a single project and seeing it through to “Fade Out” or “The End.” Of course there have been plenty of abandoned projects along the way – what writer doesn’t have those? – but basically I’ve been finishing something every year.

One thing I haven’t been able to do with any degree of success – though I’ve tried this many times – is finish more than one project at once. There have been several times when I was working on both a novel and a screenplay, or two screenplays, and even though they were in different forms – an outline and a first draft, perhaps – neither one would end up finished. I don’t know if it’s because both were inherently weak ideas that just couldn’t hold my attention, or that I was too distracted to give either the attention they deserve. In any case, they would all go to the graveyard of dead projects, and I’d start over with something new, something I vowed to give all my creative energy until it was actually finished, not abandoned.

A writing teacher I worked with a few years ago talked about “living your book,” and I think that’s the method that works best for me. Even when I’m not actually at my computer, I’m thinking about my protagonist, imagining what she’s having for lunch, the conversations she’s getting in, whether she’s ogling the college boys at the gym. It makes her feel more real and keeps me motivated when the last thing I want to do is sit back down at the computer. But when you’re working on more than one project at a time, that could be a prescription for schizophrenia.

But real writers – professional writers – don’t always have the luxury of working on a single project at a time. The best of the best are editing one book while outlining another and working on a screenplay based on their bestseller. Is their ability to juggle multiple projects one of the factors that led to their success, or were they forced to juggle as a result of it?

This week marks the start of yet another experiment in whether or not I can finish more than one project at a time. I’m 2/3rds of the way through the first draft of my second novel, and a producer I worked with casually last summer has asked me to rewrite his treatment. I’m also awaiting notes on my first novel, on which I’m working with a freelance editor, so I’ll start a rewrite of that soon (I do have book editors waiting on it.). And I recently took a job as an editor at a small publishing company, and I’m expecting a project from a writer sometime at the end of this week.

I jumped right into all that work by going to the gym this morning, then answering email, playing on Facebook and Twitter, and now writing this post. I’d been feeling stuck on the new novel, and even though I got some ideas for additional scenes, I’m afraid this is the one that’s going to get neglected – I’m usually better at meeting my obligations to other people than the ones I make to myself.

For those of you who juggle multiple writing projects, do you have any hints on how you’ve been successful at it? I’d much rather spend the afternoon reading your comments than doing any of that work!

Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

My son turned 19 on Friday. It was his first birthday that we spent physically apart. In many ways, though, we’ve been apart for years. Kids don’t just grow up, they grow away from you, and while that’s true for both genders, I think that boys – with their society-mandated ban against emotions – are colder during the process.

An only child, my son was an exceptionally happy and affectionate little boy. As his father worked out-of-state and came home only on weekends for ten years, the two of us were especially close. He would sit in my lap when we watched TV together. I’d usually wake up to find him in my bed. We’d talk endlessly as I drove him around town to his various activities and lessons. We’d go to movies together, dinner. We were best friends.

And then he started high school. Suddenly I was persona non grata.

I had expected this, to a certain extent, but what I hadn’t expected was that he’d completely and categorically deny our previous closeness. It was like being dumped by a boyfriend who then claimed you’d never gone out.

When I’d bring up certain cherished memories – “Remember when we went to Disney World? Remember seeing Peter Pan on Broadway?” he’d claim complete ignorance. He had no recollection of his boyhood love of Peter Pan, of watching the Cathy Rigby tape over and over again, singing, “I Gotta Crow.” And he’d get angry if I tried to refresh his memory.

Since so many activities were just the two of us, it meant that these memories were now mine and mine alone. (Unless they have to do with a feat on the baseball field. He has no problem recalling those, no matter how young he was at the time.)

Sometimes I feel like a stalkerish ex-girlfriend toward my own son. “Don’t you remember how great this was? Don’t you remember what we were like together? Why don’t you love me anymore? Waaaa…” I was hoping not to ever behave this way again after getting married.

I’ve been told by friends who have older children, that eventually young men grow out of the angry teenager phase and stop pushing away Mom so hard. I don’t know if that means the memories will come back too, though.

Breaking up is hard to do. Especially when you’re getting dumped by your own child!

Six Month Check Up

The wind is blowing dead leaves into my pool.

It’s a warm and windy day here on the Gulf coast of Florida. The white caps fly across the intercoastal, the fronds on the palm trees are swaying, and my biggest problem is those leaves. Actually, it’s not really my problem. The pool boy comes once a week. He’ll clean them out.

We’ve been here almost exactly six months, and six months is a good time period to take stock of all that’s good, bad, and ugly in a place or a situation. Before we moved here, I knew four things about Florida: warm weather, Disney, beaches, and hanging chads. Now that I’m a resident, though, it seems that every story about some weirdo doing something really wacky comes out of Florida. And, yes, unfortunately there’s also a lot of violence, not only of the Trayvon Martin variety, but it seems that parents abuse and murder their children on a regular basis here in the Sunshine state.

So what is it about Florida? Why do the weirdos and others who can’t seem to cope with the daily stresses of life all seem to be located in the state that 30 Rock’s Jack Donaghy once called “America’s penis?”

I think the combination of good weather and a low cost of living attracts a number of people who, for lack of a more delicate way of putting things, aren’t in complete possession of all ten jacks and the little red ball. That is certainly the only explanation I have for seeing things such as a woman in the back of a pick-up truck, sitting on an office chair and holding a mounted moose head in her lap.

The people of Florida are a wonderful mixture of contradictions. The flat land and great weather makes everyone a jogger or bicycle rider. But they also all smoke like chimneys. Have you ever gone running, only to find yourself behind another runner who is puffing away at the same time? It does spur you on to greater speeds as you attempt to pass her and remain upwind of the cigarette smoke.

There are bikers of both kinds, the cyclists and the motorcyclists. What these two groups have in common is that neither of them believes in helmets, and the state of Florida acquiesces by refusing to pass a law making them a requirement. I know nothing beats the feeling of the wind blowing in your hair, or what’s left of it (a lot of these motorcyclists are fat, bald old men). But cracking open your head against the pavement isn’t the world’s greatest feeling, either, and if I were a biker, I’d give up the former to avoid the latter. But most biking Floridians don’t agree with me.

The architecture seems to mirror these contradictions, at least in my own little corner of St. Petersburg. Where we lived in Maryland, zoning laws kept commercial establishments well away from residential areas, and HOAs made sure that all the homes in the neighborhood looked alike. There’s none of that foolishness here, which is why I live within walking distance to some very cheap motels and the houses around me look nothing like the one I live in.

Florida has also helped prove Darwin right, if not in terms of human evolution – there are several lines of humanity here that should have died out if survival of the fittest were still in play – but in how lower creatures evolve differently in different types of weather. Darwin went to the Galapagos Islands to discover that in isolated settings, larger species become smaller and smaller species become larger. What that means here is that instead of having your ordinary German cockroach prancing around your kitchen on occasion, we have the much larger Palmetto bugs who branch out into rooms such as bathrooms and bedrooms. Oh, and they can fly. In some cases, right into your hair. And then there are the rats. In Maryland, I was used to the concept of rats being small disgusting furry things that congregated in the dumpsters in urban alleyways or unfortunate NYC Burger Kings. In Florida they have evolved into fruit rats. Instead of garbage, they feast on the orange trees or whatever trees you might happen to have in your backyard. They run up and down the trunks of trees as you are trying to enjoy your nice outdoor meal in downtown St. Petersburg. They also enjoy backstroking in your pool and setting up shop in your attic. But luckily they are still small, disgusting and furry. Some things should not be tampered with.

On the whole, though, the weather and the beaches make up for the bikers and the bugs. So I hope we’ll be making Florida our permanent home, although the jury’s still out on what the foreseeable future might bring. Although if you read me posting about picking up smoking and driving around on a motorcycle without wearing a helmet, someone might need to shake some sense into me.

Happily Ever After

Tuesday night marks the end of Private Practice, a traditional nighttime soap with a loyal yet relatively small (compared to its parent show, Grey’s Anatomy) following. While ostensibly an ensemble, the show revolved around the trials and tribulations of Addison Montgomery, an OB-GYN/neonatologist who was as mixed up in her private life as she was brilliant in her profession. Addison is one of my all-time favorite fictional characters, so I’m sorry to see the show end. Even more disappointing, though, is the way the show is ending. Creator Shonda Rhimes decided to give Addison a “happily ever after,” marrying her off to a character who was basically a deus ex machina since he showed up a few seasons ago.

Romance is one of the most popular genres in fiction, whether that fiction be TV, film, or novel. And the best romances are drawn out as long as possible. It starts with that early tension; the “Will they or won’t they?” Obstacles on top of obstacles are thrown in the path of the would-be couple. They come together, only to break up, and then come together again. Only after they’ve been tested again and again do they earn a happily ever after. This formula is the one that hooks viewers and readers. It’s called “intermittent reinforcement,” and it’s akin to rats pressing a bar to receive a food pellet. The ones who receive a pellet every time give up as soon as the pellet stops coming. The ones who never received a pellet give up quickly too. But the ones who sometimes get a pellet and sometimes do not keep pressing that bar again and again and again. And humans too are much more likely to persist in an activity that gives them intermittent rewards, and watching their favorite couple finally come together again after a break up is a reward.

Addison had a relationship like that with Sam, her best friend Naomi’s ex-husband. Respecting Naomi’s feelings, Addison tried to stay away from Sam, and an entire season was dedicated to their “will they or won’t they.” Then Addison decided she wanted a baby, while Sam thought he was done with parenthood. When Sam finally came to his senses and proposed, Addison threw him over for Jake, the aforementioned deus ex machina. Jake, whose only flaw is caring too much, is the man Addison will marry tomorrow night.

What if Carrie had ended up with the Russian artist instead of Mr. Big at the end of Sex and the City? Even though the Baryshnikov character was based on SATC creator Candace Bushnell’s then husband, the producers realized that the viewers’ emotional satisfaction of seeing Carrie finally end up with Mr. Big after six seasons was more important than trying to recreate the creator’s own then-ending.

I believe that writers, be they in film, TV or book, have an obligation, when a romance is so central to the story, to deliver that emotional satisfaction to their fans. And that satisfaction is only delivered when the central couple comes together at the end of that long, rocky road. Otherwise, why bother taking that journey with them? Yes, I know that traditional daily soap operas, which are most invested in these types of relationships, are also the most constricted from being able to deliver that pay off. Unless canceled (and those canceled soap operas did deliver a few couples finally getting together after years of trials), most shows wind up losing an actor and therefore being unable to deliver the happily-ever-after – at least permanently. Recently General Hospital lost an actor who was part of not one, but two of these tortured couples, and he did get a happily-ever-after with his wife before being killed off. It wasn’t the ending the fans wanted, but the best the show could do when the actor left, and I think that fans – the sane ones, in any case – understand that. But when the show can deliver the experience the fan craves, and chooses not to, then it’s no surprise when fans turn their attention to something else.

Like romance novels, for instance. Romance is the top-selling genre, and each book features a central couple who go through “will they or won’t they”, many trials and tribulations, to end up together by the end of the book. It’s a proven formula that readers want.

But it’s not something that Private Practice will deliver tomorrow night. Yet, ironically, it is perhaps the most realistic ending. For in real life, when our relationships are so problematic, they end. And we end up with the guy with whom there was never any drama.

Of course, real life is the reason we watch soap operas.

No Pain, No Gain

This scenario happens on playing fields every day, all over the country: The coach notices there’s something wrong with his star player. Maybe he’s limping; maybe she’s pulling her arm. And the performance is being affected too – throws are off their mark; running time has slowed. The coach asks, “Everything okay? You look like you’re in pain.” And the player shrugs it off. “I’m fine, coach. Put me back in, coach. I’m the only one who can win this game for us.”

It happened last week in the Redskins/Seahawks game. After insisting he was “hurt, but not injured,” RG3 collapsed while trying to field an errant snap. He had surgery a few days later on his previously repaired ACL. While there’s been a lot of discussion about whether Mike Shanahan made the right call -- believing his rookie quarterback and keeping him in the game when all evidence suggested he was too hurt to perform -- there’s been little-to-no discussion about the warrior culture that led an extremely talented young man to put his own future at risk rather than hand the ball to his very capable back-up. Simply put, this response was drilled into RG3 at a very young age: Only wimps cry about the pain.

Shortly after children leave toddlerhood behind, parents are told to ignore their cries on the playground. “He’s not hurt,” we’re told after our three-year-old falls face first off a swing. “Do you want your kid to become a cry baby?” So we tell them to “shake it off” or that they’re “not really hurt.” When they fall but don’t cry, we praise them for being tough. Soon, our children learn they can get attention from sustaining bumps and bruises without tears. If they’re really hurt, they best keep it to themselves.

It gets worse when our children start to play organized sports. Even though sports are beneficial for children of every ability, those who stand out are the ones who are rewarded. Children who run slowly, whose throws are erratic, and who – heaven forbid – cry when they’re hit in the face with a soccer ball – are marginalized and often quit before their efforts can result in improvement. And the better kids, seeing this, learn the lesson: Don’t show weakness. And don’t ever admit you’re in pain.

My son started playing organized sports in kindergarten. In the second grade, he took a soccer ball to the stomach. Even with his face buried in my stomach so his teammates wouldn’t see his tears, he insisted to his coach that he was just fine to go back out and play.

Later, he would forsake all other sports for baseball, a sport unique in that too much practice and too many games can be detrimental to players, especially younger ones. There was one kid, Jeffrey, who was a superstar all throughout middle school. Whenever he pitched against our team, we knew we’d lose. Yet at the same time, we knew Jeffrey was being overused and his days as a baseball superstar were probably numbered. Last I heard, arm injuries kept him from doing anything more than designated hitting.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of, “It’s just one game; how much can it hurt him.” With competition for playing time so fierce – even at the middle school age – a kid’s fortunes seem to rise and fall with every game. Consciously or subconsciously, the child gets the message to swallow his pain and go out there and play. When he was 12, my son walked around with an arm that was broken in two places for almost a week – and played half a baseball game before the pain got too bad. We joke now about how he hit a grand slam with that arm, but the truth is, he never should have been in the game to begin with.

My son was lucky enough to have coaches in middle school and high school who kept pitch counts and stressed arm health. Other than that broken arm, he never complained of pain – insisting, at my questioning, that there was a difference between being “sore” and being “hurt” – shades of RG3’s justification of hurt versus injured. Even so, he told me that every kid on his high school baseball team was playing with a hurt arm. Why don’t they tell the coach? I asked. Because then the coach wouldn’t let them play.

Does this type of attitude persist in female sports, or are women smarter about listening to the pain messages their bodies send? I tend to think not. Women are just as competitive as men, and the “mommy wars” have broadened to the very day of birth. Since the days of Lamaze, women are encouraged to forgo pain medication in order to have a “natural” birth. If you give in and ask for medication, you’re a failure.

Even with the explosion in prescription pain medication abuse, health experts say that doctors actually underprescribe pain medication and underestimate their patients’ levels of pain. Some of that may be fear of being tricked by an addict, but it’s an attitude that persists throughout society – suck it up. It doesn’t really hurt that bad.

Maybe this is a problem unique to playing fields and delivery rooms. After all, it’s hard to see how society is impacted because one boy doesn’t go on to play college baseball; one girl has to quit basketball. But I think it has a broader impact. By teaching children to ignore pain, we teach them to distrust their feelings and their bodies. They swallow pain; they swallow anger. But in the end, it always comes out. And sometimes the impact is a lot greater than a loss in a play-off game.