Game of Thrones Syndrome

So here we are, the first day back at school. It’s a BIG day; one of my kids is in junior high now, and the other is finishing his last year at our much-loved elementary school.

Or maybe

The kids are more like this:

But for the most part, all is roses and happiness and only slight disappointment over the assignation of option classes that were not overly desired.

For the most part, it does feel good to be back into the swing of things. I am not generally a huge fan of fall, mostly because I love summer, and because fall in this part of the world is a brief interlude before the long, long winter sets in.

Speaking of which, my husband and I watched the Netflix series The Get Down, which deals with kids in the Bronx in the 1970s. If you are a fan of hip-hop, rap, or disco music, I highly recommend this series. I am a fan of all three genres, and so I really enjoyed it.

Well, I mostly enjoyed it. A lot of the time I kept saying to my husband that I thought something awful was going to happen. Was their apartment building going to burn down? Was someone going to get shot on the subway? Was everyone going to meet the end in the most tragic way possible? I kept worrying and worrying as I watched the show, in an awkward, unsettled way. My husband was feeling the same way, and when the series ended on a happy note, I couldn’t figure out why I was stressed out watching a cheerful television series in which the young people are not the problem, they are the solution.

It is what my husband and I have dubbed “Game of Thrones Syndrome.”

Watching Game of Thrones has conditioned me to expect the absolute worst outcome in everything. Sure, that girl is singing beautifully, but someone is probably going to cut all their throats like in the Red Wedding. That kid who has the bootlegged tape of another MC? He’s probably going to have his penis cut off and mailed to his loved ones. Those two are romantically involved? Someone is probably going to poison one of them and then put the other secretly on a boat, floating down the Hudson River.

Anyway, I’m determined to enjoy fall – even if it is so very brief and is only a harbinger of WINTER IS COMING – and so this morning I dug out my tall boots, my scarves, and my long black flowy sweaters. I am eagerly anticipating the return of the Macintosh apples, and crunchy leaves and blue skies, but you can keep your pumpkin spiced anything. Blergh. That stuff is nasty.