RandomBliss: The Walking Dead of "Lost"

Poppies will make them sleepy!

Listening to: Look how young he is!

Today's Bliss Formula: I've been in a cleaning out mood. Organizing, throwing away, and making room for whatever newness wants to enter our lives. A long weekend with Frog this weekend, starting tonight when she gets home!

We don't own a television. I hesitate to tell people this once they know we don't have a car. "Freaks!" I imagine them thinking.

But television gets in my way. Seriously. I am not exaggerating when I say that having a TV, for me, is akin to having a fully stocked bar in the house if you are an alcoholic. I watch and I surf and I leave it on. We put it in the basement, in the closet, and I go and get it and put it back and get it out again.

So when our TV broke down three years ago, we kicked it to the curb. For good.

Then along came our beautiful Apple computers that play DVD's.

And yet I have found that there is something inherently different about watching DVD's. First, you are in total control of the content. Second, and so important, there are no commercials or news breaks. And finally, it makes watching special -- like it must have felt when people could first go to the movie theatre -- it's an event.

We have avoided a lot of cultural trash -- and a lot of fear mongering -- by not having a TV.

And then we find things we love...

And the show Lost has been one of those things. We weren't on board until about a year ago, so we watched the first two and half seasons sequentially with no waiting required. Now every week, Frog will email me from work on Friday morning and write "Is the Lost up yet?" She means, is last night's Lost available on iTunes yet?

I find this program fascinating for so many reasons.

To begin, it has to be the largest epic story ever told. Think about it...It certainly is longer than any epic ever written down. And it is the longest, single narrative arc program ever to run on Television. (Don't talk to me about Doctor Who -- there's no single, unitive arc there. Sure, there's the single idea but no arc -- no plot and characters that change and morph and grow and expand.)

But it's the content that really gets me. I see the writers working out all the little details as they go and I see them noticing mistakes and correcting for them. The writers are rather amazing.

And the inclusion of all the mythology and philosophy!

It makes the geek in me ever so happy to re-watch and make new connections.

And I know the creators have been claiming for a long time that there is nothing supernatural going on, but I think we can all agree that that is smoke screen, especially since the freaking island just up and moved.

Besides, like with literature, once it's out there, boys, it's out there and it's no longer yours -- it now belongs to the reader/viewer.

The "text" comes alive when the reader/viewer consumes it.

So my reading of Lost, regardless of what the writers/creators have in mind:

It does not matter if these people are alive or dead in the real sense, because every one of them was spiritually dead before they got on that plane. In one way or another, because of themselves or other people, they were the walking dead (and I think it significant that John Locke was the only one of them who couldn't literally walk).

Their time on the island is their chance to complete a particular karmic cycle or to redeem themselves...whatever language you want to use, whatever makes sense to you.

And those who get off the island have cut themselves off from that chance. They have gone back to sleep, gone back to being one of the walking dead.

The whole entire program could be seen as a metaphor for awakening. And yet some of us are more comfortable asleep... The entire program shows us how every minute of every day is about choice, about personal responsibility.

The character, besides John Locke, who has really gotten to me was Charlie. Poor Charlie -- always blaming other people for all his bad choices in life.

But on the island he learns to love himself and to care for others. He learns that his own life is nothing compared to the larger picture. That it is just flesh and there is no real death.

The scene when he dies, crossing himself as he drowns, I think, is the most touching scene of the whole show so far.

Charlie has found his redemption. Or in karmic terms, I don't think he's coming back as a worm and he was pretty much headed in that direction.

The most thrilling part of this show, for me, is how it's making people think about these things. Think about our place in the world. Think about community and what it is. Think about what it is we really need in this life. Think about philosophy.

Think philosophically. This show is teaching people something about critical thinking.

If that doesn't make television a viable and creative medium, then neither are books or music or art. And sure, it's still mostly trash (with a huge dash of fear) -- but look at the most popular books in your local library!