(no title)

Some clouds, unseasonably and uncomfortably warm this afternoon. Head stuck in business mode all day, so not much time for reflection. Which is good, because you get in a reflective mode too often or for too long, you stay in that mode for weeks at a time, and it's not healthy, at least for me. Just finished Season Six DVD of Buffy -- my last. For reasons I've entered here previously, I did not see any original broadcast shows except for a few at the very end. I've either watched season-sequenced repeats or DVDs, in order of S4, S5, S1, S2 (plus end of S7 original broadcast), S3, full S7, and now S6. So, it's goodbye* to that world. And it's a good goodbye, because I think S6 was the overall best, except for the two-hour opener the network wanted and the "invisible" Buffy episode (rumors still abound on that one). The season's theme strikes at the heart of what this journal is all about: had adult responsibilities been dropped on my head suddenly at 21 (a year before I finished college), I would have fallen victim to all the things the characters did in S6, in one form or another. The gift of adult support I received then has helped me survive a life that's since contained what I consider more than its fair share of disappointments, setbacks, and failures. I recall the first one (that I really felt, anyway -- some left me numb). To your basic American male, career is everything -- and I lost my first one at the relatively young age of 29. Facing what I called "the big Three-O" with no real prospects at all was very tough to take. Twenty years later, the same thing happened, and it's actually been tougher, even though I was kind of prepared for its eventuality. To me, the real message in S6 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer comes from her ex-boyfriend Riley: "Wheel never stops turnin', Buffy. You're up, you're down -- it doesn't change who you are." I think that says it all.

___
*It was hardly 'goodbye'.


LJ orig.: 11/27/06