My name is Donna, and I am a netflixaholic.
I change who I want to be when I grow up, depending on the series we watch.
I blame my son Dylan for making all of this happen, he told me that I needed to sign up and watch Bates Motel, because…”Mooooooommmm, I swear this is our family…” I just wanted to see his take on who he thought we were. Needless to say, if you’ve ever watched that show, I was disturbed, and intrigued, and mostly addicted.
Our next addiction was Orange Is The New Black. Okay I can say without question that I did not want to go to jail, but I wanted to be awesome like her…because…jail.
And then along came Weeds. The proper, socially acceptable part of me was mortified, but the other part of me that sometimes escapes was like…best MOM ever. With few possible exceptions…like the getting away with murder and stuff. And sometimes, when she was doing things that she knew in her heart were questionable, I was like…been there done that. It’s a Mom thing, you don’t always make the right choices when it comes to raising your kids. Her mistakes just made mine look a little less horrific.
Breaking Bad came shortly after that…again, it’s a parenting thing right? I know that no matter what I did wrong, it wasn’t cooking crack or trying to hide a kajillion dollars to save my own ass.
I have also been sidelining with Once Upon A Time…because it makes fairy tales get all muddled together and still make total sense…it brings out the little girl in me, you know the one with a bit of a dark side.
And now we are onto Madmen. All I have for this series is crazy love. I was born 15 years to late to have been an adult when this was how life was, but damn it to hell, I remember so much of the stuff that went on.
I am seriously amused by the drinking at work, the slutting around, the littering…insane amounts of cigarette smoking and the lack of any kind of regard for drinking and smoking while pregnant. I mean what the hell is going on here?
And yet…at the same time, I want to be them. I want to be Betsy, because she is gutsy as hell, I want to be Joan Holloway, because…who the hell doesn’t want to be a hot fiery redhead. I want to be Peggy…because finally after living her life as a mouse, she realizes her potential and grabs it. She turns from a girl into a woman who can take on the best of them in a man’s world, and usually comes out on top.
Roger, who is a man whore…but totally forgivable for reasons I can’t even understand…and Don, or Dick or whoever he really is…because well he is totally nauseating and yet undeniable intriguing in exactly the same breath.
We are only just into Season 4, and I dread the day when it is over and I have to find someone else to be. But until then I will live through the advertising agency that is the job of my dreams, with some of the most excellent characters to look up to…
It has helped us pass away a long and dreary winter with humor, surprise and something to watch on the cold boring January nights. It has made me want to reach for more…never screw around and be thankful that I have a man in my life with more than half a brain and whose loyalty was apparently unheard of until well after the 60’s passed us by.
Thank you Netflix for filling a void that I didn’t actually know I had. Everyone needs to aspire to something and monthly you help me to grow and change, even in just tiny little ways. I now know for sure, that I never want to go to jail, be a drug dealer, cook Meth, go to Never-land or marry a man in 1964.
Who says you can’t learn anything from watching TV?