My name is uhhh, Eri, Erwin... and I'm - an As The World Turns addict. "Hello, Erwin"... Okay, so it's not quite as dramatic as that, but it might as well be. How else can you explain why a grown woman and member of the Pine View Elementary school board advisory hasn't been able to walk away from this soap for 27 years? I mean the characters of daytime television are dumber than doorknobs with story lines that are not even theoretically possible, yet darn it if I'm not shouting profanities at the dvr if it malfunctions and I can't get my fix.
Recent case in point: Super neurosurgeon Dr. Reid Oliver decides he's going to get Dr. Chris Hughes a heart come hell or, (in his case), oncoming train. So he drives like a teenager who just got their license to the neighboring town, the train annihilates him and he still manages to give his gay lover, (Luke), power of attorney to hand over his heart to his arch nemesis. Of course, it's a perfect match and with the clock winding down at the eleventh hour, Chris survives. Oh, c'mon!
First of all Reid was a total prick and we "world turners" are supposed to believe that he magically transformed into a hero, whose superhuman powers can convince the hospital to give their extra heart to him just because he says so? Like he would even give care or his Doogie Houser status would trump the patient who was on the actual waiting list. As if that's not bad enough, the so called genius, then hits the road in his crappy Dodge, (like he wouldn't own a BMW), believing it to be faster than a train, only to stall on the tracks with a seat belt that won't budge!
So, let me get this straight. One of the most brilliant medical minds the world has ever seen can't think under pressure and goes down for being a dumbass? Even if his car failed him, couldn't boy wonder just have reclined his seat back and squirmed his away out to safety like the snake he was? No, in this magical world he has to die in true melodramatic style. Somehow he manages to come out of the minor collision with his body still in one piece and, in his best Tarzan impression, is able to utter one word dying wishes to his boyfriend who just happens to be at the hospital. But the worst part was when, if by some other worldly force, he suddenly gets a second wind and in classic cheesy last words fashion, he mutters, "Who knew I had a heart to give?"
Uggghhh!!!!!! You didn't!!!!! You SUCKED Tin Man! How you got Luke is beyond belief, but don't you fucking give up and die you pansy ass bastard. Think of Luke and Chris! Your boyfriend in going to fall apart and Chris will turn into an ass if the transplant comes directly from you. Luke needs to stop looking at the world through rose colored glasses and Chris can't be the man of Katie's dreams and father to baby Jacob with your cold heart. So wake your scrawny ass up out the coma you've conveniently slipped into and go get that heart you promised everyone, you piece of shit!
The story was complete crap but I loved it. I hated Reid but there I was shouting at him through the screen as if he could hear me and my heartfelt pep talk could will him to live.
But soaps have a way of doing that. They draw you in with their overly emotional characters who go through the gamut of larger than life experiences and you can't help but want to temporarily run free from your own ordinary world and come along with them. I first started watching when I was eight and through the years I've seen it all from: the evil deeds of a psychopath, multiple love triangles, heartbreaking miscarriages, fairytale weddings, Scottish castles, Italian mobsters, disease, civil unrest, actress who went on to be movie stars, and plenty of fine men who couldn't keep their shirts on if they tried. Not that that was a problem, although every guy I dated probably wasn't aware that they were secretly being physically compared and sometimes replaced in my mind to Holden, Damian, Mike, Simon or Dusty. (Dustin, I'm really going to miss him in particular. I can only pray some other daytime show brings sexy back and he finds another gig right away.)
But more than this, these shows, whose plots revolved around family, had a way of strengthening ties to my own. My mother was the instigator, having watched the show since it's inception back in 1956 with her mother and carried the tradition on with her own daughters. My older sister had the sense to out grow such a guilty pleasure, preferring to stick to prime time candy, but I never strayed too far. Sure there were years when I drifted away but I knew I could always catch the occasional show and be up to speed for at least the next couple of months as, in soap land, a character's simple dilemma goes on and on until you think the writers are going to run out of Emmy quality monologues that convey the same message. But even if they do, viewers are already hooked and will always come back for the instant emotional high.
And so that's how it's always been for me all these years. This world of fantasy kept on turning like a constant in my universe along with sun and the moon and I never imagined it would ever change. I record the show every day and watch it,(eventually), more or less as it plays in the background while I'm busy doing other things, knowing that at least one other person I care about is doing the same. I know this to be true as it somehow becomes a topic of conversation with my mother every time we talk on the phone. She'll start out telling me about the latest deals for Southwest flights, or my niece's dance recital and out of nowhere, she'll ask me if I saw who they're pairing Lily up with now. "Do you believe she falls for Craig?! It's so dumb. The guy is like twenty years older than her and was married to her sister and slept with her mother..." Lily is not a member of the family, yet we're concerned with her well being as if she were, much to the angst of my father who mysteriously ditches the other line when the discussion veers away from reality to tend to some urgent plant watering emergency. Truth be told, we probably both would have jumped ship from the show too a few years ago, when the writing started to make the characters look even more ridiculous, but I stay connected for her and she for me.
It's been our own special "thing" for nearly three decades and tomorrow is the final air date. The weak economy, like the train that derailed Dr. McDouchbag, is running it off the tracks so another talk show or game show can take it's place and I'm sorry that it won't be there anymore. The legacy has ended, just when I had started to hook my older son and his friends into wanting to see Barbara talk to a clown dummy while being held hostage in a party warehouse. Now, my mother has replaced As The World Turns with The Young and the Restless and I'm going to have to introduce by boys to ex-hooker/alcoholic turned Jabot CEO Nikki Newman after not following this show since seventh grade summer vacation. It just won't be the same.
