I have a bit of a confession to make: I think I’m addicted to Netflix streaming. Well, specifically, I’m addicted to television series(es?) on Netflix. I started off slow with a few gateway shows that I could take or leave, but in the twenty-one months Baby Gray has been alive, two shows in particular have made my heart go pitter-patter.
Initially, I fell in love with Friday Night Lights. Baby Gray was still a tiny thing, and he napped his day away, so I occupied my time with Tim, Matt, Julie, Coach Taylor, and the rest of my good pals from the show. To this day, it’s not surprising if I cry when I talk about that show. It only ran five seasons, and Mr. Gray wasn’t really watching it (he’d catch an episode here and there, but mostly I watched during nap time–which was often), so I finished it pretty quickly. Then I missed them. I felt like I knew them and then I didn’t. Then they were gone.
Recently, we started watching One Tree Hill. Well, I started watching it, but Mr. Gray joined me a few episodes in. Then we were hooked. We watched a few episodes when we were home in the evening after Baby Gray’s bed time. It was a show I liked along with one of Mr. Gray’s favorite ways to wind down, so it worked. Nine seasons later, it was over. Gone. Done.
I made a connection then. I felt like I feel when I finish a good book. You see, television shows are meant to be watched over time. The depth of the character development is so much more than a movie; it’s much closer to the character development one would find in a book. Don’t hear me wrong–I love a good book. In fact, it’s rare that I like a show or movie even half as much as the book, but when you cram a television space into a smaller space than it was intended, you get that book-esque feeling that goes along with it. You’re not meant to spend all your free time getting to know them; you’re supposed to spend an hour a week with them. You know the characters. You laugh with them, cry with them, and befriend them. This sounds like a lot of thinking for some television.
It is.
I’m absolutely appalled at how much time and energy I have focused on these shows. As I was whining about the loss of One Tree Hill earlier this week, I read a blog post by a mother who didn’t get to bring her sweet babies home from the hospital; they were born early and didn’t make it. And here I am upset over fictitious television. Seriously? Something in this scenario has got to change. It starts with me.
