Randomosity

You ever have those moments where you feel like you've got things kind of figured out? Like, maybe not life, per se, but you feel like you're finally past this one particular hurdle you've been struggling with, you feel like you finally understand, something just clicked, and whatever it is won't be a problem anymore?

I have moments like that fairly frequently. Well, maybe not frequently, but I have them often enough to remember having had them before. I also have them often enough to have come up with a name for it.

I call it...The Full House Effect.

Specifically, the part of the show about three minutes before the credits when a family figure explains to someone who's been having problems or creating trouble throughout the episode why what they did is wrong, and the person in question having a moment of understanding where they seem to have things figured out. The episode ends with an "I learned something today" note and everybody's happy. You feel like they're really going to be happier for the lesson they learned from here on out.

Now, Full House is of course not the only show that has this effect, in fact, just about every show does. One of the best examples in contemporary media in my opinion is Scrubs. Zach Braff's character JD always (seriously, every single episode) has a crisis, then at the fifteen minute break, a montage illustrating the problems going on in the character's lives is played to a voice over by Braff explaining what's wrong. Then after the last commercial break, another montage shows how everyone overcame their personal demons, learned a little something, and became a better person for it, again to a voice over by Braff explaining exactly how they did it and what they learned.

Seeing something like this, it's common (for me at least) to do a little head shake in disgust at the foolishness of 1) the characters and 2) the writers. The characters for always learning an important lesson and then promptly forgetting it by the next episode, and the writers for expecting an audience to believe any real person could be that dense.

But if you stop and think about it...well, we kind of are. Well, not even kind of. We are that dense. At least, I am. I don't know how many time I've felt like I was finally over some wrong committed against me or some unfortunate event that took place only to find myself back in the exact same situation emotionally that I was before I thought I'd figured it out. More to the point, I don't know how many times I've thought to myself "that was a terrible idea" or even "this is a terrible idea" and gone ahead and done it again anyway.

Which brings me to my next topic, one of the best sitcoms of all time, and probably some of the best television programming of all time, Friends.

Now, in Friends, they did have the same per episode arc and the same "intro, conflict, resolution, lesson learned" formula, but they also, contrary to most tv shows of this type, had many many over-reaching arcs that carried through several episodes. Characters would learn and change based on their experiences, relationships would evolve realistically, and crises were not always resolved or averted in a single episode.

The most obvious and extreme arc would of course be the Ross and Rachel dynamic. Will they/Won't they/Why did they/Why didn't they and all the other relationship drama carried over ten entire seasons of the show. Established in the very first episode and not resolved until the series finale, this was an arc to remember. However, they didn't have to make every episode about Ross and Rachel to keep it alive. There's dozens of episodes, heck, even entire seasons where nothing of substance happens between Ross and Rachel, no conflict, whole years with the relationship just kind of gelling in the friend phase.

Just like in Full House or scrubs, when you feel initially like it's so unrealistic for characters to behave in this way, but when you think about it it's actually very similar to life, just compacted down to a bite size half hour episode, this habit of Friends to allow long periods of time to go by with no real developments in such an important relationship is also VERY true to life.

I'm not going anywhere with this, btw. I probably should have mentioned that earlier. I'm just having all these random thoughts and I thought I'd type them up.

I feel like there's more to discuss about Friends, but the next point I want to get to is this. These shows all seem to be, based on my earlier observations, more accurate representations of real life situations than they appear to be at first glance. HOWEVER. I feel that to a certain extent, the similarities we see between life on the screen and life in our world are not due to art imitating life, but in fact life imitating art.

This happens on a personal level, a cultural level, a subconcious level, I think it happens all over the place. We see these shows, we see how people act. I think it's safe to say that a lot of what people learn about social interaction is learned from television. Not that it enslaves you, and obviously it's affects would be more severe one someone who's ratio of real life experiences to hours spent watching television was very low. But still, have you never had an argument that drags on for hours, and the whole time, in the back of your head, you're looking for that one-liner that will make the studio audience gasp, and the folks watching at home feel like the conversation is at an end as the screen fades to commercial?

Have you never been more dramatic than was necessary simply because that's how things are represented on tv? Characters in a show have to be more dramatic than you would be in real life because they have only thirty minutes to fit a lifetime's worth of drama into. Have you never longed for the love shared by Monica and Chandler? Christian and Satine, Turk and Carla, hell, Scarlett and Rhet Butler. These relationships all had problems, all had their ups and downs, just like in life. But there was never a question in any of them, even when Chandler pretended he didn't want to get married and Richard came back into the picture with his heart on his sleeve and marriage on his brain, there was never any doubt of the fact that Monica and Chandler loved each other, and that it would work out.

As people we see that and...we long for it...we mistake that for reality, for true love, and we expect to find it in real life. And as a result, we are constantly disappointed. Men spend their whole life looking for their Rachel, someone who is simply meant to be with them, someone who'd forgive them for the worst wrong you could commit, someone who'd overlook all their flaws and love them for who they are. Someone who is perfect for them. That person doesn't exist. The one thing these shows fail to represent in a manner that is true to life (in my opinion) is that no one, is meant to be.

This isn't just for people who look for movie or tv love of course. Some people consider themselves very rational as far as believing in fairytale love goes. But when you hear "Fix You" and your heart breaks to feel the way he must have felt when he wrote it, or when the chorus of "Come What May" inspires you to believe that you just haven't found the right person yet....or...or when "First Day of My Life" tells you how you should feel when you meet the right person....You're falling prey to the exact same phenomenon. All of life wants to believe in love, and so all art reflects that desire. Music, movies, tv, paintings, poems, everything reflects the basic human desire to love and be loved. And the people who make that music or those shows or those stories are just like us. And so we identify with their need, their desire, that they express through their art. And we see that and mistake it for a sign that that kind of love really does exist. We hear these songs that have been written as a form of escapism by one person who wants so badly to believe that there is truth that love is real...and we fall into it's snare. It's so easy to believe it when John tells you that All You Need is Love.....it's so easy....

Maybe fairytale love doesn't exist. *Gasp* Maybe as soon as we can realize that and stop rejecting one person after another for some minimal flaw that prevents them from ascending the throne or soulmate we keep in our minds, the sooner we'll realize that people are all just people. Love is real, but it's never perfect, and it will always take work, and there will always be something in your way. All that you or anyone else can do in this life is to decide for yourself if the other person is worth fighting for. And tragically, most people decide that the flaws are too great, they can't see this person ever becoming their "lobster" and so they decide to reject them and keep looking. People have to realize that...well...you'll never find the person you're looking for, and eventually you'll settle, or you'll end up alone. We don't have to lower our standards or look at it as settling, we just have to stop expecting someone to fulfill every need, to complete every part of us....to be perfect for us.

People are not perfect. The love shared between two people will never be perfect. Stop looking for it.

*Sigh*

Forgive the diatribe, I say this to myself as much as I do to anyone else. If I believed it, I wouldn't have to say it so forcefully. Truth is, I'm still one of the people looking for my lobtser. I want love to be perfect and true and flawless and beautiful. I want to know. I'm starting to believe that I never will, and it never will be like it is in the movies, no matter how badly I want to believe it. And so I'm trying to convince myself of that, and if I can help anyone else make a worthwhile realization along the way then...well maybe that's a good thing.

Thanks for reading.

loren