Feeling LOST?

I have a reputation for being a bit of a TV junkie. It's not like I sit for hours in front of the tube every day and soak in the stuff on the screen, but I do get a bit hooked on some of television's great series. What makes these series compelling is the depth and magnitude of their characters.

For example,

This show has storylines that are powerful and mind-blowing, albeit far-fetched at times. It's more than just a drama about a planeful of people who are stranded on an uncharted island with no means of rescue (which is ironic, since their island comes stock-loaded with everything from food to a washer and dryer (it makes some sense if you watch the show, but nevermind that).

I recently re-watched the season finale from last year, and it really shocked me how much I got out of it. The character of Jack Shepherd was really important in this episode. Jack is trying to lead the survivors of the plane crash to a radio tower to turn off a jamming signal so that they can use a satellite phone to contact a boat that's allegedly off the shore. "The Others," the inhabitants of the island who were there before Jack and Co., attempt to stop the Lost-ies from reaching the radio tower.

As the leader of the Others, Ben, puts it, "If you contact that boat every living person on this island will be killed." He claims that the people on the boat aren't a source of rescue- they're out to slaughter the Losties.

It amazes me how far Jack is willing to go- willing even to sacrifice the lives of three of his friends- in order to get rescued. Sure, it may seem logical to want to get off the island, but back home Jack has a dead dad, an ex-wife who hates him, and a job that consumes him. And yet what he really wants is to FIX things. He became a doctor to fix broken people. He leads the Losties because he likes making sure things are right. He alienates every person he loves because he has to fix them.

How many of us are like that? All too often we see things as problems, and everyone and everything in our lives is a case that we have to solve.

Why can't things just be fine as they are? Why do we have to seek greener grass? Why is it NEVER good enough?

Later in the episode we gain perspective into Jack's life off the island. In a flash-forward sequence, we see that Jack and his love interest Kate have made it home, but Jack is a washed-up, beard-wearing, alcoholic, drug-addicted, suicidal mess. He demands to Kate that they made a mistake, that they have to go back to the island.

How ironic. He fights for what he hopes are better times, and then he realizes what he was missing and wants to go back to how it used to be.

I for one am sick of trying to fix bleak situations. I'm sick of sacrificing everything to get off the island. And I'm sick of trying to go back to the place I mistakenly left. I'm sick of thinking that it doesn't matter where I am, the grass is greener elsewhere.

Are you sick of it too?

Live big. Stay classy.