Twenty Down and Fifty-Six to Go: The Roosevelts

Tonight, we are watching the last 56 episodes of The Roosevelts on PBS. This is a fascinating series tracing the history of the Roosevelts from Teddy to FDR and throwing in lots about the women they loved and then didn’t.

It’s narrated by Peter Coyote. He is famous for his narrations, lauded, but I find his voice to be hypnotic, sedating actually. I’ve wondered if people having major surgery could maybe forego anesthesia, pull a heated blanket up to their chins, and listen to a documentary narrated by Peter Coyote.

But we are suckers for history and documentaries, and, in this case, I am especially intrigued by Eleanor Roosevelt’s transformation from a very shy young woman into an iconoclast. She divorces FDR without divorcing him, recognizing that he pretty much went on to other women without her, and then she creates an independent life with other women. She basically leaves him and their children to do her own thing. All on the sly.

As much as I’m impressed by Eleanor, I’m amazed at FDR’s ability to lift people up with his voice on the radio. And his willingness to do huge sweeping things to bring the country out of the Depression. He smiles throughout all this in the most captivating way, as if we are all potential special friends, his sidekicks. Such a gift.

Anyway, so we watch these endless things because we ought to know more history and because they are tremendously narcotic. The old man, in particular, loves documentaries. He’s watched The Dust Bowl at least fifteen times and when he is bored or out of sorts, I suggest we watch it again. It’s also hypnotic but in a dystopian, catastrophic way. FDR’s charm shines through in The Roosevelts. The Dust Bowl doesn’t have that relief. Just children dying of dust pneumonia and townspeople beating jackrabbits to death with shovels.

Still, we watch. It’s good for us. So are old films about D-Day and the liberation of concentration camps. We came through a lot to be here. History isn’t just what happened last year. That should lead me to say that life in America is a long game, that there is probably a place for patience, or at least fortitude, as everything seems to be unraveling in this moment. But that’s too philosophical for me. I’m not that big a thinker. I’m just over here with Peter Coyote and my heated blanket.