Bang!

I'm a reruns girl.  Give me some good 80's and 90's sitcoms - Roseanne, The Nanny, Golden Girls, or the holy grail...The Cosby Show - and I'm in heaven.  But I recently fell in love with a current show - the Big Bang Theory.

Boy howdy, is it a HOOT!  I used to believe that Frasier was the smartest show on television, but The Big Bang Theory takes it to a new level.  They are geniuses, masters of all kinds of technical, practical, and theoretical knowledge, but living out their dorkdom instead of smothering it in fine wines.

Though I'll take a glass to try...who am I to turn up my nose at two psychiatrists, after all.
But anyhoo.

The Big Bang Theory gives me plenty of laughs, and lots of opportunities to feel clever by proxy when I get a joke.  But it's also intimidating.  The main characters are supposed to be my age-ish (later middle 20s) - 3 have doctorates and one "only" a masters (he's "just an engineer", lol).  I have a bachelors; one that it took me an extra year to earn due to undercontrolled AIs.  Not only do these guys have several advanced degrees, but they embark on crazy capers with seemingly no physical limitations (except for Leonard's noteworthy lactose intolerance).  The only masters program I'd even consider is a particularly laid back one where I'd take 1-2 classes at a time, max, and I have no interest in anything more rigorous.  I love to learn but getting my tuchas to and from work each day is demanding enough.

Also, I realize I'm in the majority of non-doctoral degree holders, and that the other main character (Penny) attended community college.  But Penny shows me up too, with her beautifulness, blondness (and not even dumb blond), and energy to run around dating, working, acting, etc.  While waiting for her big theatrical break, she works at the local Cheesecake Factory - a ridiculous sounding envy of mine is people who can hold waitressing jobs.  I could never be on my feet all day and hold the trays laden with plates, let alone remember orders with brain fog.  I've never sought a waitressing job and some people think it's because I'm snooty, but really it's because I wouldn't last one day.  Not that I want to wait tables, not that I'm ungrateful for a chance to get the education, skills, and connections I needed to land the job I have, but if it came down to doing whatever needed to put food on my family's table someday it's not likely I could do it.

But, for all my over analyzing, I do try to sit back and just enjoy the fiascoes brought to me by TBS.  Any show on TV is going to have people with more energy, attractiveness, and accomplishments than me...and it should! Heck, even I wouldn't watch a show with someone like me - my goal is to escape reality, not wallow in it!  TV is there to distract, inspire, engage, even occasionally aggravate, not to provide a comparison for my life.

And then I had a realization.  I'm also a bit obsessed with the show's theme song - it's quite clever, and I was able to memorize it without looking up the words...except one.  There was one word I couldn't make out no matter how many times I caught the intro.  The song summarizes evolution starting with the Big Bang (duh), and the first lines are "Our whole universe was in a hot dense state, when nearly 14 billion years ago expansion started ___," after which it launches into a rapid recap of autotrophs, neanderthals, and modern sciences.  I COULD NOT GET THAT WORD!  So finally today Shawn looked it up for me and man, was I surprised.  Wait.  The word was "wait"!

Of course!  In even in the most literal reading of the Bible the world wasn't created in a day, and every secular theory takes even longer (for the record, I think the Bible IS telling the story of a "scientific" process but this isn't the time or place for that discussion).  We have to wait.  Whether you believe in the Judeochristian or Muslim God, another deity, the spirits of nature, or unguided celestial accidents, you have to wait.  For a very long time.

Waiting.  Ah yes, my old nemesis, Patience.  "Pat" and I don't get along well - never did, never will.  It was bad enough when I was young, but once the S-word (Sjogren's) came knocking at my door in high school, I developed a need to everything now before it's too late and that really meant Pat was tossed aside.  But as you and I know, I must learn to have a love/hate relationship with Pat.  Sitting in doctor's offices, anticipating the next new treatment, even holding out for a diagnosis to begin with...waiting for pain meds to work, for insurance to approve it, or for a friend to "get it"...waiting to get closer to an event to see if I feel like I can handle it; waiting is part of my life.  We have little choice but patience.

Of course, patience doesn't mean passivity.  Patience doesn't mean hoping and dreaming and pining only.  Patience can partner with action, with the power of words, or with creativity.  We can always DO something now, we just still have to WAIT for it to take effect.  And since we will have to wait, the sooner we 'do', the better.  And, there's the indulgent side to "waiting".  The type of waiting that involves slowing down, smelling the tulips (roses upset my allergies), trying to care for our own needs, and pacing ourselves.  Not cleaning the entire house in one day but instead splitting it up into chunks.  Taking that bubble bath because we need to soak our muscles & joints.  Getting in a nap because we need it medically.  These kinds of waiting are also hard, especially when they mean we have less free time than our pals or take longer to see results when we work on something, but we can also get some good from them.

I guess if Sheldon and the rest (Sheldon's my favorite - he plays the Theremin!) can "wait" for the big bang to create life, I can wait too.  I can form a treaty with "Pat" and try to let him do his thing while I do mine - activism.  Now when I hear the theme song come on, I get excited for the beyond-witty antics about to come my way...but also hear a little reminder in every day life to remember to wait, slow down, even (dare I say it) relax.  I like to think this show not only entertains me but calls me to be better to myself and more patient with others.  A very wise show, indeed.

Image of Sheldon and his theremin (I highly suggest YouTubbing this scene) found here.