There is one thing I know for sure.  If you throw some redneck white trash people in front of a camera and add a little conflict I am going to be watching that show.

I am a reality t.v. junkie.  I love the mama drama of 16 and Pregnant.  When the boats launch on Swamp People I am rooting for Junior to get the big gator and just maybe a set of teeth. Give me the Real Housewives of just about anywhere and I will become emotional invested in their lives like I had a stake in the outcome.

I don’t know why I am so drawn to the drama of others.  Lord knows there is plenty of drama going on in my own life.  In fact I can’t believe they haven’t shown up with cameras and started taping.

My guess is being from a small Southern town I was just raised to be all up in other peoples business.  We don’t call it being in someone’s business because all our “sentiments of concern” are followed by “Bless their heart”.  That phrase alone can negate an entire conversation of trash talk.  There is no greater collection of intellect that a group of Southern Baptist women standing around after church solving everyone’s problems.  We can fix the entire congregation in about five minutes and make it to the Waffle House before the Methodists.

Reality t.v. is just the old time soap opera with a twist.  Growing up I would watch the Young and the Restless and As The World Turns with my grandmother. I can still hear her saying “that Nicki Newman is nothing but a strumpet.”  When she and her sisters would get together they would talk about the characters like they were real people.  Many hours were spent speculating on the paternity of someones baby or how evil one character or another could get before somebody shot them.  A good shooting could be strung out over an entire summer.

The only difference between those stories and mine are that mine are real people which means there are real problems I need to help them solve.  If only they could hear me through the t.v. I could tell them that their baby daddy isn’t going to “step up” after the baby is born. I could help Junior find the gators and get him home safely to his wife.  And as for the Real Housewives, well it might take me a few weeks but I could straighten them all out.

It’s no wonder I can’t sleep at night.