Lost -- The End

LOST

That's right. In bold. Where do I begin? I guess I should start at the start.

In fall of 2004, I wasn't doing much with my life. I recently graduated college, I was working for Atlas Home Improvements and The Window Doctor, I ate way too many burritos and drank far too many cans of Pepsi. And I watched TV all the time. I mean, all the time. I.refuse.to.do.that.thing.with.the.period.after.every.word. That makes you look like an idiot. Ah, crap.

Now, if you know me or if you've been following/stalking my blog for a while, you know that I am obsessed with a few things: my forthcoming New Zealand adventure and The Lord of the Rings. I can see you all rolling your eyes now and thinking, "Here he goes with that shit again." Too bad. But because, I was/am obsessed with the world of Tolkien and anything that had anything to do with it, I followed the rabbit trail into the world of LOST because of Dominic Monaghan. He was a hobbit. Shut up.

Ladies, you still interested? Good. I thought so.

In the past day (and few hours) the LOST series has ended and has ended with a *poof*. People were expecting a *BANG* but when was the last time a TV series ended with one of those? Remember how pissed off everyone was when Seinfeld ended with a lousy clip show and they all went to prison or something? That was 200 episodes of nothing. A show that didn't make you think and didn't make you pay attention except for the The Betrayal episode that was essentially run backward. It was like Memento but funnier... and Jewish. If that offended anyone, I apologize. I have no idea if Leonard Shelby celebrates Hanukkah, but I'm going with my gut and saying that he doesn't.

I'm glad that LOST ended the exact way it began: literally and figuratively: with Jack in the bamboo forest by himself. It's your own fault if you haven't seen the finale yet.

Now my good friend Nick has got a blog up about how much he disliked "The End" of LOST. We have watched the finale together twice since it has aired and neither of our opinions have changed. He wanted answers. I wanted resolution.

In these past six years, I've come to sympathize with almost all of the characters on one level or another at some point in time or another. Some of the characters I thought were just annoying, like Ana Lucia portrayed by the drunk driving Michelle Rodriguez. Yes, some of the characters just annoyed the shit out of me. Some of them I felt instant sympathy for/with. But, I think that the biggest reason that I liked it is that, as Nick so pointed out, the details didn't matter.

Funny how that works out, in'it?

In the past few years, I have been on more job interviews than I can shake a stick at. One of the questions that I seemingly always get asked (and one that really has no bearing on my ability to do a job and is really just flat out annoying -- take note fellow HR and Talent Acquisition gurus) is "How did you end up here?" The answer that I want to say is, "It couldn't matter less." What someone seems to want is a 20 second answer to an answer that would take years to answer: from the adventures that I had in Michigan, to the end of those adventures, to the first real heartbreak that I had in Nashville, to the first girl that I dated in Nashville which lead to the first real heartbreak I had in Nashville, to the trip across the Atlantic, to my job being eliminated, to the trip across the country, to being financially at rock bottom when the job with the new position you've accepted tells you that they don't have the money to pay you, to how you ended up delivering flowers, to everything in between. Really, does that sound like a clear and concise answer that can be summed up in two or three sentences? No. And I think that's why I liked it so much. It's that the details that got you to wherever you are in life don't matter as much as where you ended up. Sometimes, things don't make sense, even after you've after you've analyzed them to death. Like why you got your heart broken or why you really got your heart broken. Or why your job was eliminated "in order to create efficiencies". Or why the girl who works at the shop next door keeps calling you "one of her best guy friends". Or... You know... All the other minutia of life.

So really, it (life, LOST, whatever) comes down to one thing: what did you do with the time you were given? Did you make your world, your reality a bit of a better place? Did you run over everyone? Did you even know what was going on? Did you live the life you imagined? And that, my dear readers, is what matters. Are you living the live you've imagined? I don't mean doing what you want professionally. That doesn't mean a drop in the bucket compared to making sure your friends have beer during a flood; that doesn't matter compared a really good book you read; that doesn't matter compared to the road trip to the beach you took your sophomore year of college. It's the adventures that you have and the characters on your journey that you encounter that shape who you are and the story you are on.

And so, LOST, I want to thank you for being a small part of the past 6 years of my life. I think it's fair to say that quite a bit has changed in my life in that time. Yes, the girls. Yes, the trips. Yes, the jobs. Yes, the everything. Yes, the complete and total monopoly you've had on my one weeknight each Tuesday or Wednesday or whatever night you aired. But you were worth it.

LOST, In six years, you've lasted longer than any relationship I've had by 5 years and 5 months... I'm just glad I don't have to give you half my stuff. 'Cause really all that would be would be my collection of LOST and Futurama DVDs. And my Lord of the Rings things.

Thank you for the epic journey. It was worth it.