Food for Thought: Love the Questions
It’s my first time writing on the Lostpedia blog. At first, I was unsure of what to write. I flipped around ideas of doing a blog about Watchmen or The Lawnmower Man. However, when I simply quit thinking about it, the perfect blog came to my mind.
My grandfather died last Thursday, at the age of 70. He was afflicted with a lung condition that eventually caused his breathing to stop. It obviously caused my absence from the wiki for a few days surrounding this fateful event. Aside from being part of my family, however, my grandfather was also the reason that I began watching Lost.
He urged me to catch up and start watching Lost at the beginning of season three. I was reluctant to such a large commitment, but after a few nudges from him, I picked up the first season DVD. It was (of course) addictive, and I finished it in a week. Season two came afterward, and I finished it in another week. My grandfather and I would bounce theories off each other constantly, throughout seasons three and four. He was the only person in my family (besides me) who really enjoyed the science fiction element of Lost, and we had many hour-long conversations about just what the hell was going on to those survivors.
A few days after “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham” aired, my grandfather was taken to the hospital and put into intensive care. The next Wednesday, he was almost unable to watch “LaFleur,” due to his drifting in and out of sleep. I never got to theorize with him about that episode, because he died the next day.
It certainly raised within me a scary question: what if we don’t make it to the end? Like the survivors on that island, there’s no guarantee that we’ll get to see the big reveal. But there’s something that my grandfather said to me a few weeks before he died. Things weren’t looking great for him even then, and he knew it. We were having one of our numerous discussions about Lost when he said one of the many profound things he’s been known to say.
“I’m probably not going to make it to the end of the show,” he said, somewhat sadly. ”And I might not get all the answers. But I haven’t worried about the answers for a while.” He paused, a grin spreading on his face. “I’ve learned to love the questions.”
He was right. Too many of us complain that there aren’t enough answers being given, and that there are too many questions popping up. But it is a mystery show, after all. We should all learn to love the questions.
23 comments:
This is a great first blog, Sam. It's exactly what I wanted with other writers to add input with discussion blogs and posts to provoke debate and discussion. Obviously the episode reviews are important, but it's the deconstructions and points of interest posts that are really special here. I thought your post was really well-written.
As for the post topic - I do love the questions, and it's made my imagination run wild about DHARMA and stuff. I don't mind the little things remaining open-ended... but I do want the big questions answered :)
I just really love what you wrote. It is actually choking me up (maybe because I lost a student this past week to a similar death, but not only that). You write beautifully and you make an excellent point. I'm sorry for your loss; your grandfather sounds like a totally cool person. Aloha, Cate (mother of Caden, Young Hurley)
Thank you, Cate. I'm sorry for the loss of your student.
This is one of the best things I have ever read. My grandma just passed away a little over a week ago, so I feel you. My condolences.
what a touching story! I think the creators of the show would highly agree that the questions are more fun than the answer. In fact I KNOW they would - If you haven't seen JJ Abrams' speech "The Mystery Box" from the TED conference a while back, it's RIGHT up your alley - http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/j_j_abrams_mystery_box.html
I have seen that...and I agree with him completely.
Great blog Sam!
That's a great story :)
The questions have been my favorite part since the beginning.
I just read this, Sam. What a terrible, wonderful story. Wonderful for the gift your grandfather gave you, terrible that he was not able to stay with you to the end of the show. But wonderful again for the perspective, which applies as much to life as to "Lost". Much love, Robert
Loved this post! Thanks for sharing this Sam! It really puts into words what so many of us feel about wanting to know the answers. Even my boss reminded me the other day that most beloved TV shows have very contrived unsatisfying endings. Of course that gave me anxiety since I want the answers to be the best story ever told! We do need to just try to enjoy the ride. I hope you find Peace about your granddad's passing.
thanks for writing this post. it is a tribute to your grandfather and a very impactful share too. my own father passed away a few weeks ago...
similar to you, i watched the first 2 seasons in the 10 days before season 3 began. in fact, i had to watch season 3 premiere on abc.com because i was still watching the finale for season 2.
i have always loved the questions and thinking about what the answers might be. i only wish we see get 2 episodes every week. since that is unlikely, i like to come to the lostpedia on sunday and monday to review the wiki page for last episode and search for info on thoughts i have had concerning answers. i know the answers are not here, but sometimes i find info that contradicts my thoughts and i can move on.
has anybody considered that damon and carlton are setting us up for 1 or more spinoff series? i realize there are a lot of answers to come, but wouldn't it be just like a network to not let a good thing end. to me, it seems some of the questions coming up recently are totally unnecessary. specifically, all of the questions brought up in the last episode. assuming, the lost in the 70's "losties" will be reunited with locke in the present.
maybe i am completely off base, but i am sure most of us would watch a show that had to do with the creation of dharma. lafleur barely gave us a taste of what we really want.
I doubt any spinoff would survive the ratings long. Knowing all the answers would make the beginning of Dhrama hard to do.
Namaste..I bet Ben shows up as a child this week since that phrase was used several times in his flashback to arriving as a child.
Will all of our 70's losties have to die? Think about this...they can't arrive on 815 if they have already met all the folk from this season. Unless they are concealing their knowledge in order to accomplish something that fixes the Island forever.
I just watched the sneak preview on the main Lost website where Jin finds Sayed! Perhaps when 316 crashed it was sucked back to the same time as our left behind folk. How else could Sayed be found by Jin in his Dhrams jumpsuit? I guess this week will solve how all of them get back together and in the same time period.
Joyce, and everyone above....
That's a really good point, does the endgame of the show take place in the 70's?? Is that...possible? It's blowing my mind to imagine that all of what we've seen of the island - a rag-tag group of others and abandoned dharma stations - might be the leftovers of an apocolyptic war?
SO the alternative is, what? more time travel? We know that Locke is in the present (so to speak) along with the rest of the crash survivors, and as far as I can tell, somehow the rest of the 06 is going to have to travel to meet up with him.
Do you guys agree? Will locke be the anchor that keeps this story from ending before it began, literally?
Locke may be that special person after all.
I just realized that Ceasar found the abandoned Dhrama station and it looks like Daniel's notebook. I guess 316 is in the right time and everyone else is in the 70's.
Which is interesting that Frank and a woman took a boat as soon as they could. What will they find on the main Island? 2008? And the survivors such as Bernard and Rose. Are they in 2008 or did they get flipped into the 70's. There were a goodly number of people together on the beach when the flaming arrow attack came. Everyone got scattered and so far all we have followed are our main characters.
Which reminds me after I posted that last blog. Rose and all the last 815 survivors can't be in the 70's or Jin and Miles would surely have found them during their patrols. Where are these people? I am worrying about them like they are real people and my own kin folk! I hope this gets resolved soon.
@joyce - yes, locke is in the present so i suspect we will eventually see him find a way to bring the rest of the original losties into his specific time period, but perhaps not.
i disagree that we know the end of dharma. we do know that ben was involved. we also know that it was many years after he came to the island, as well as some of the other players involved with the gassing of dharma's island residents, but we really do not know anything else about the rise and fall of dharma on the island.
whatever happens in the arc of this currently shown dharma time period, i am assuming we will not get any of the answers i would like to know about the rise and fall of dharma stations on the island. specifically, why are they really on the island?
i suspect we get only 1 or 2 more episodes about this pre-ben dharma era...
@flickmybic I agree! I don't believe that we know the dirty details of dharma's demise... don't forget that Ben said "I was one of the people smart enough to make sure I didn't end up in that hole." (man behind the curtain). I'm SUPER excited to learn more tonight...
....it just occurred to me -
when ben states that he was ONE of the people smart enough to avoid the purge, are the others are dear LeFleur and crew??
Wow. I agree with your grandfather on one thing: I love the questions. I disagree with him on another. I think he knows the answers now. They have a way of knowing those things up there :)
What a great blog!! I'm not ashamed to say that last paragraph even choked me up a little bit.
That is a very sad/great story. I too, had a grandfather who somewhat got meint watching the show. I was beginning to catch up at the start of Season 1's episode "The Moth" and I have been watching until now, never missed an episode. But my grandfather never made it past Eko's death. He couldn't stop talking about the first time when Eko encountered the monster, when he stared it down, leaving Eko unharmed. And knowing that my grandfather was going to die soon of cancer, it just hurt me that seeing his favorite character die just a week before he did. But great story, and I hope you get over this loss, I'm sure he's happy that you're enjoying his gift he gave you, for the time he was here. =]
Dan
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