In Which I Spoil A Number of Key Plot Points

I had this really horrible moment last week. I had just finished sending off the last of my graduate school applications, and I decided to celebrate with a mocha latte from Starbucks and an episode or two of The Sopranos. (Have I mentioned that I love the Sopranos? I do, I really and truly love the Sopranos. I told my boyfriend that they are all my friends and now he thinks I'm insane and that I possibly have hidden homicidal tendencies. But I don't care. I haven't liked a show this much since Reading Rainbow.)

Anyway, I put the Sopranos DVD in the machine, and I turned on the television. The television proceeded to blink "INCORRECT DISC" at me. I took it out and reinserted it. The TV kept insisting "INCORRECT DISC." I told the TV that I didn't ask it for its personal opinions on what I watch, thank you very much, and even if I choose to watch nothing but Norbit all day, interspersed with bits of FOX News, it has to play them, because it's a TV, not Roger Ebert, for crying out loud. The TV's response to this outcry was "INCORRECT DISC."

So I took out the incorrect disc, and sure enough, it had a giant crack down the middle. I was furious. I almost threw my mocha latte at the TV, but then I remembered that how much it cost me (the latte, not the TV) and I refrained. As an alternative, I called the people at Netflix some names that would make Tony Soprano blush. Then I ran back to the Post Office to return the incorrect disc. I was mad. I was so damn mad. Here I had been all ready to find out what happens to Adriana and Tony Blundetto, and now I had to wait days for a new DVD? This was completely unacceptable. (As a future English teacher, let me add that this is an excellent argument for reading- books rarely experience technical difficulties)

The thing is, though, I am totally behind. Most people found out what happened to Tony Blundetto while I was still in college. Most people have moved on to reflecting on the final episode. To these people, I am a random girl who has apparently spent the past five years in outer space, and now wanders around saying things like "Wait, Darth Vader is Luke's father? Bruce Willis had been dead the entire time? Do you believe that? Oh, but I totally think Harry and Hermione are going to get married."

When you're that far behind the times, nobody really tries to keep you in the dark. They figure that, if you haven't found out already, you don't really care. Even my DVDs have spoiled certain plot elements for me. I try not to look at the pictures on the DVD case, or read the little synopsis that they show at the beginning of each episode, but it's hard sometimes. Sure, they never explicitly tell you what's going to happen, but whenever the plot summary says "Tony has to make a crucial decision about So-and-so," or "Tony must finally come to grips with the reality of so-and-so's loyalties," or "Tony must show so-an-so who's the real boss of the Soprano family," you just know that So-and-so is going to end up dead.

This is the negative part of beginning a series months after it has already ended. On the upside, when an episode ends in dramatic cliff-hanger fashion, I can just click 'play' on the remote, and watch the next episode. I do not have to spend a week wondering what's going to happen next. More importantly, I do not have to agonize for several years between seasons, constantly wondering what's going to happen next.

I know how painful that waiting time is. I read Harry Potter. I spent several years in high school absolutely convinced that Ron was going to die, and maybe Hagrid, too. Then Cedric Diggory died instead, and I spent the four years after that convinced that Hagrid would probably die in the fifth book, and then the sixth, and so on. I developed complex theories based on obscure mythology in my attempt to figure out what would happen. It was fun, but I was always wrong. When I reached the end of Deathly Hallows, I was sort of relieved that most of my favorite characters had made it through unscathed, but I was also sort of disappointed. I mean, here I'd literally been worrying about their welfare straight through from my high school days to my own days working at a high school, and most of them turned out just fine. So why did I invest all that energy into preemptive mourning?

Now I see my ninth-grade students read the Harry Potter books, and it's hard for me to believe that they'll just be able to fly through one book after another. I try avoid starting sentences "Back in my day!" because it makes me feel really old. But this is one time I just can't resist. Back in my day, we couldn't find out what happened in the next book right away. Oh no, we had to wait years, and years, wondering, agonzing, scouring interviews with JK Rowling for clues, walking barefoot through the snow to Barnes and Nobles at midnight...It was a struggle. Kids these days just don't understand that.

On the other hand, kids these days don't get to spend years wondering, and I admit that's a little sad. More than a little. I sort of grew up with Harry Potter. (Well, not really; even when I started reading them, I was already fifteen or sixteen. But still, a person does plenty of growing between fifteen and twenty-four. ) I didn't get to grow up with the Sopranos. Actually, I'm not sure that it's such a good idea to grow up with The Sopranos. I would not have been able to fully appreciate it when it first aired, that's for sure. But at least I could have spent a little bit of time wondering and waiting...and not just waiting for the next DVD to arrive from Netflix.

All right, you'll have to excuse me...Tony's in a coma. I'm pretty sure he's going to wake up eventually, but I want to find out for myself.