Why am I so sexy?

Page 5

Meganumbe

Every year around this time we have to deal with turkey fat. We eat so much Christmas turkey, mashed potatoes and pie, so as not to have the ability to buckle our pants. Well, this year not only is there fat, but there are a lot of junk gifts that I'd like to give back, or throw away. I'd consider a trade for some of those micro-fibre waistbands they hand out at Ottawa cocktail parties. I'll keep my new TV for now.

Will APTN-TV ever stop running the ad about the AB-FLEX exercise belt? I got three of them for Christmas. I'll probably end up donating all three to the AFN (Assembly of Furious Natives) in Ottawa. I am sure that with all the per diems they hand out at their monthly executive soirees that someone among their ranks could use the belt. Not that I don't need it. I just couldn't get it to stay on.

And how about that zig-zag Hollywood Indian girl hair parting comb? Can you imagine if all of our Indian Elders and traditional men had this comb? I think it might get more of them on TV, but just once, I'd like to see an Indian man part his hair with one of these combs.

This reminds me of an idea that my mother thought of 10 years ago when we were surfing the primetime menu of mainstream commercials. Four beautiful women from different cultures were extolling the virtues of Oil of Olay in foreign languages.

"Why don't they ever ask Indian women to do these commercials?" she asked, an answer to her own question waiting on the tip of her tongue.

"What would you say Mom?" I dutifully asked.

"Well, Edji-tannoogeawig medagnum ettaas sompegnesyan awaki youd meemay."

After I recovered from uncontrollable laughter that shook me so hard I fell off the couch, I turned to Mom whose serious gaze had alerted my abandon.

"What's so funny?"

She had said, "My skin would be well tanned once I had soaked myself in this white man's grease." When I repeated what she said, mimicking her gestures, we both convulsed with laughter.

If Mom were alive today she would watch the APTN. What would she think? She would walk away from the commercials, a genetic trait I wish I had, but she would likely watch the soaps. What soaps? The one from New Zealand that has one brown face in it.

She would ask, "Where are all the Jeff Chandler movies? He played an Indian. How come they don't have Maliseets on TV? And, where's those Oil of Olay commercials you said we'd make?"

My mother would have turned out to be one of the APTN's biggest fans. I know she would have liked all those CBC (Caucasian Broadcasting Cats) re-runs, since she never watched them when they were fresh and on CBC's network. Now that they were on our channel, it somehow made the stories better.

Mom was a news junky. She always wanted Peter Man-to-Man of CBC's nah-shun-all to wear a hat.

"He should hide that head."

She would have said the same about some on-air talent at APTN, but she may have been more cutting in her criticism.

"If they're bald, they can't be Indian."

When all the women around her thought that Yul Brenner was handsome with his shiny top, she downgraded him to the simple status of "ugly man who needs Oil of Olay."

"But bald is in," I tried to assure her. As usual, Mom's mind was set. Bald was something she associated with her cousins going off to an Indian residential school, those wretched institutions that were set up to beat the Indian out of Indian kids. Suffice it to say, Mom was an expert TV viewer.

But she would have scolded, perhaps even pitied, me for being a two channel man. APTN and the CBC, that's all I ever watch. Everything else on TV is too white and therefore programs are in too much denial. MTV is just a barrage of sexual imagery. Oh, and there's Fashion File. Why doesn't APTN do a fashion file? Aren't there enough new baseball hat designs? Fringed dresses? The latest in stretch-wear?

Then there is the blabber-mouth channel where all of CTV- (Cheap TV) generated talk shows come to roost.

APTN already has some of thoe and I try not to watch them. But there is one I couldn't resist.

Why are Indian men sexy? That was the topic of an APTN program that calls itself "current affairs." Were the guests having a current affair, I wondered as I watched the host squirm nervously as his guest extolled the virtue of his adventurous lips. I immediately went to change the channel for fear my mother was watching me from above, but the zapper fell from my hands.

During the commercial break I dreamed about next year's turkey dinner. I slipped on the Ab Flex belt for one last go at burning fat. As the jelly rolled, I thought to myself: Why am I so sexy? It's probably from all that Oil of Olay I used as a kid getting myself ready for a career in television.