"What's gonna happen next?!"

It's approximately 8:26pm, and I'm sitting on the first-floor lobby couch watching an old episode of LOST. Libbie is FREAKING OUT because, as of three days ago, she'd never seen them...and now I'm wondering if I really should have given her my Season 1 to borrow. But, almost to Season 2, she's knee-deep in constant thoughts and a determined mindset concerning these characters, who've yet to have their full stories told. I think about how we get caught up so easily in such things.... strange adventures, broken lives, stories...stories...STORIES. Don't we love stories? the Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, Harry Potter, Star Wars, (and up and coming) the Host... plus, there are all those TV series. We live in the land of "TV Series Galore." But what would we do without them????? (maybe engage in our own lives more often? ...nahhh)

Well anyway, the TV people know what they're doing with this whole "series" thing. I think they caught on to the pattern of humans liking some kind of movement towards the unknown... the unknown of someone's past, the unknown of someone's future... maybe we would call it "potential," because it is a reality that "could be" but that has not yet been realized. And it's all UNFOLDING... ahhh, the unfolding... like a nice little suspense-filled gift. Except, the unfolding of a TV character's potential could end in a reality that none of us would ever really want... or, it could be the ending that all of us would hope for. Either way, it is not OUR unfolding story, so we're not stuck with the conclusion if we don't like it. Maybe that's really why we watch these so much... to get the unfolding without the fear of it ACTUALLY being our own lives that such terrible things are happening to. And then there's the part of us that lives vicariously through the extraordinary feats and treasures discovered in their "lives." Which makes us a tad jealous--but the vicariousness satisfies for the moment. Which makes me think... ya know how people say, "That'll never happen to me"? Maybe it's cause they're too busy watching it happen to a character instead...
...Of course, I'll probably never kick-butt like Kate, or "heal" like Claire, but the more real things--of broken lives being redeemed, of victories, of love, of humor and unlikely friendship--those could happen to me....if I engage in a TRUE story (one much greater than myself).


...But for now, at 9:13pm, I'll just let Hurley have all the bad luck--cursing the numbers that made him wealthy--and still watch Libbie freak out as that burning question stirs her mind... "What's gonna happen next?!"