Tonight begins the end for one of the only reasons I have HBO. Dave and I have gone around the block about this one so many times that even our friends are all confused as to whether we actually have HBO or not. We have these long conversations about getting rid of cable television all together. We discuss the fact that we could join NetFlix and just watch movies. We wring our hands and admit that we're unemployed and that the extra money we're paying for cable television really shouldn't be in the budget.
And then I whine about not being able to see the final eight episodes of Sex and the City and Dave capitulates and says okay.
So tonight, the last hurrah for Carrie and her friends begins. The last eight episodes. I have watched this show since its inception. I read the book before the show. I read the columns before the book. I shopped at Patricia Field before she was Patricia Field. I have identified with Carrie Bradshaw in many ways, but probably most specifically in her love of beautiful shoes. The shoe episodes of that show got me every single time.
A very little known fact about me is that I once was a columnist for a newspaper like Carrie. Instead of writing about sex and the single girl, I was writing about teens and the ones who were actually managing to do positive things instead of ending up in juvenile detention. Every week I delivered to my editor at least 2000 words about a teenager and his or her perspective on the world in 1980. However, unlike Ms. Bradshaw, my writing career took a left turn somewhere during college and I ended up a playwright with my observations reserved for spoken words on a stage instead of just newprint on a page.
Now, what am I? A woman who sits and yearns for a fictional character's shoes and won't allow her husband to cancel the cable until she's seen the final episode. If I were a person who got depressed, I think that would be certain cause. But even here, I can see the silver lining.
Unlike Carrie, I have a husband. I managed to work through all those bad relationships and my own neuroses to find a wonderful man and to also find the courage to actually say "I do." And though I will be the first to tell you that a woman does not need a husband to be complete by any means, a husband (or wife or partner) can be a beautiful thing. Unlike Carrie, I think I'm willing to admit that you will never actually figure it all out. So much of her life is spent trying to sort it all through, guess what someone else is thinking, predict the if onlys. I've learned from life that you just need to let it come and keep yourself open to all possibilities. Fretting too much only gives you wrinkles.
However, just like Carrie, I will always swoon over the beautiful and perfect shoes. A woman can never have too many shoes. Never.
