The Next Right Thing

Over the course of the pandemic, the boys and I have made a running joke out of several songs from the Frozen movie franchise. The correlation between a cinematic celebration of sisterhood and a real-life global plague may not seem obvious at first. But stay with me...

Our initial favorite was "For The First Time In Forever". This is the one where Anna is so excited about all the things she's going to get to do "for the first time in forever" because her sister is finally letting people come to the castle. They've been "quarantined" for about a decade because her sister is...well...an ice monster. Meanwhile, Elsa's upstairs, pacing and muttering (musically, of course) that "it's only for today", verbally rehearsing all the things she has to do to keep from making "one wrong move" and accidentally freezing all her guests to death. Six months into a pandemic, I think we can all see the parallels between our world and those view-points. Just imagine that Anna is the optimistic business owner eager for the world to re-open and Elsa is every mom, privately panicking about how to keep kids from trading masks at school. You can see where we're going with this.

We first used this song after about a month in lock-down, when it was time for my youngest to go in for his well-visit. We started singing "For the first time in forever, we'll be getting in the car..." because we, quite literally, had not gotten in the car to go anywhere for a month. Ray had been sneaking out to buy groceries by himself once a week--but otherwise, we were just at the house. Due to safety precautions, only my younger son and I would be allowed to attend the appointment. This meant my older son would need to stay home with Ray, effectively missing out on his big opportunity to leave The Compound for an hour. On the day of, the older son took it in stride and made a big deal out of following our car to the end of the driveway, theatrically waving to us like he was seeing a cruise ship off. Since then, as things gradually opened up, we've sung about all the subsequent "first times in forever", like going to the store, playing with friends, or going out of town. I will never hear that song now and not think of my kids' heartbreaking excitement at getting to do previously ordinary things.

The next Frozen song on our pandemic playlist was actually from Frozen II, entitled "This Will All Make Sense When I Am Older". In this song, Olaf (the lovable snowman, for those of you who don't know) is coming of age and starting to recognize various challenges in the world. However, he's still innocent enough to assume that what seems confusing, complicated, unfair, or insurmountable to him now surely won't be when he's older--"cuz when you're older, absolutely everything makes sense!" As parents, we've spent most of 2020 explaining to our kids why we can't do this or that and admitting to our kids that we don't know when this will be over. We'd all like to think, as Olaf says, that: 

    "One day when I'm old and wise/I'll think back and realize/that these were all completely normal events!"

Unfortunately, it's not normal and there's no level of age and experience that can counter-balance the frequent disappointments and lingering uncertainties of pandemic life. It's a been a big life lesson for everyone, and one teachable moment after another for our kids, who didn't initially understand why I laughed so hard at this song. It's funny, I explained, because every adult knows that none of it is true. After that, the boys seemed to enjoy being "in on the joke" that no one really ever has it all figured out. Now they join me with jazz hands to intermittently belt out that "absolutely everything makes sense!" even when it sure-as-shit doesn't.

Most recently, we've been using Frozen II's "Show Yourself"as my song for whenever the boys ask me to do something they can easily do on their own. In the movie, Elsa is talking to a spirit voice or something--but in this house, I'm just substituting basic verbs--like "Feed yourself! It's in the pantry....." when they ask for a snack, or "Bathe yourself! It's your turn...." when they drag ass getting clean in the shower. Beyond the chorus, this song kinda falls apart for my purposes, but it's one that breaks the monotony at times when I'm saying the same thing over and over again and otherwise getting ignored.

Last but possibly most important is more of a personal favorite, again from Frozen II. This one just doesn't stop being appropriate for this year and all the unfortunate things that seem to keep happening to so many people. "The Next Right Thing" is the song Anna sings to herself when she's iced into a cave with no way out and she thinks her sister and best friend are both dead. Heavy stuff, I know. WTF, Frozen?!? It's really not a feel-good song. It's a song about grieving and hurting, and having to keep going in spite of it by continuing to do whatever the "next right thing" is. It's hard to listen to, actually. And it's really not one I rock out and change the words to with my kids. But it resonates, and it's the best advice I've heard. 

So let's all do that. Figure out what the next right thing is, and do it.