The Shield: Season 6

Nobody rests in peace indeed, least of all my fictional husband Curtis Lemansky. Season six of The Shield is the darkest season yet. I spent the entirety of the first couple of episodes weeping over the raw pain of Lem's death driving all the action.

The most wrenching moment of the entire series so far was when Vic, Ronnie and Shane opened the box of books Lem bought himself to read in prison. He had books on wildlife, art, dreams, science...all to broaden his mind and make the most of his time inside. I knew my baby was as smart as he was sensitive. Oh, Lem. You are missed.

The Shield: Nobody Rests in Peace

I'm watching the Season 6 prequel mini-sode, which is available as an extra on the Season 5 DVDs. The mini-sode intermixes scenes from Lem's sad little excuse for a funeral (he was not given a police funeral with a motorcade and scores of officers paying their respects because he died in disgrace), his murder at the hands of the callow Shane Vendrell and his participation in an interdepartmental arm wrestling competition.

Clearly, Lem is my favorite character on the show. I think his three closest colleagues are named the Bald Fella, the Redneck and 'Stache -- so great is my inability to focus on other characters when Lem is on screen. When Shane murdered him, tears streamed down my face. But this mini-sode was even crueler to me as the viewer than the actual episode in which he died. There is something wrenching about seeing someone at his zenith (in good stead at work, with his three best friends and colleagues, beloved by everyone in the office for winning a competition, everyone chanting his name when he won) cut together with scenes of him dying like an animal at the hands of his best friend, his name tarnished and his reputation sullied. You deserved better, Lem.

The Shield: Season 5

Oh, Lem. Didn't we almost have it all? The fifth season of The Shield is Lem's last because his loyalty to his three friends got his (fine) ass blown up by a hand grenade.

Oh, Lem. I wish we'd had more time together. Also, I wish you were not a fictional character with a tramp stamp. (Seriously, bro. You are basically the perfect man except for this inexplicable lower back tattoo of Chinese characters. I can overlook it though.)

I wish I could meet a guy like Lem in real life. I'd tolerate the ill-conceived tat and the dirty cop business for a man as loyal, kind and fucking sexy as Lem. I'd settle for the occasional freezing of my assets due to an IAD investigation in exchange for a good-hearted man who loves dogs and kids and comes home every night.

The Shield: Season 4

Detective Curtis Lemansky continues his ceaseless and highly successful campaign to make me love him in Season 4 of The Shield.

The fourth season featured two major guest stars: Glenn Close and Anthony Anderson. Anthony Anderson needs to become a major star as soon as possible because he is a lot more talented than I imagine his work in Kangaroo Jack (unseen by me) would suggest. The Close is already a prominent star, and she acquitted herself well in her role as a put-upon police captain with few higher-ups in her corner. I don't understand why people be trying to step to Glenn Close. I mean, Glenn Close will totally come to your house and kill your pets (see: Fatal Attraction, Damages). If Glenn Close asked me to do anything, I'd be like, "Right away, Ms. Close. Anything else, Ms. Close?" or I'd be coming home to my beloved dog's corpse.

The Shield: Season 3

I'm still watching The Shield while I work from home. Sometime during Season 3, Kenneth Johnson's agent must have re-negotiated his contract to say that the actor is no longer required to wear sleeves. That agent is doing the Lord's work. Seriously, Lem hasn't had a full sleeve on in several episodes. I even saw him wearing a shirt he had previously worn in the second season (when it had real sleeves) with the sleeves cut off. Thank you, God.

The Shield: Season 2

While I'm busy working 80-hour weeks, I'm catching up on the series The Shield, thanks to the public library's collection of DVDs. I might be in love with Detective Curtis Lemansky, a character portrayed by Kenneth Johnson. He's sweet, he loves animals, he's bad enough without being beyond redemption, and he has sexy guns (both weaponry and arm varieties).









And look how cute he is holding this baby. And I don't even like babies.

Act II

F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, "There are no second acts in American lives." To that I say, "Scott, you drank too much and The Great Gatsby is kind of overrated."

I feel like my life is entering its second act right now. Act I was my 20s, in which I tried to distance myself from my less-advantaged background (not to say I grew up poor, but compared to most of my university classmates, I was a barefoot hillbilly). I worked very, very hard to build the life I thought I should be leading. When I was in high school, I was a big fish in a small pond. I wanted to prove to myself and even more to other people that I could be a big fish in a big pond as well. I went to a big, private university, where I was in an elite scholars group. I chose a highly competitive career, training for it at one of the top schools in the country, and, after much toil, got to one of the top law firms in the country. If I had gone to my high school reunion, I would have presented an image of success to my former classmates. I would have presented the image of someone who "made it" instead of becoming a townie and having a bunch of kids and getting married
young and finding Jesus like most of them did.

It all looked great from the outside, but I was unhappy. I had the trappings of success, but I didn't have the human connections and interactions in my life that I wanted. I admit that I looked enviously at my married, baby-having high school friends and thought that I wanted what they had.

The heart, like nature, abhors a vacuum. I filled the empty spaces inside me with food and stuff, and I ended up overweight and buried in credit card debt. Food and stuff did nothing long-term to cure my loneliness or sense of isolation, so I ended up piling problems on top of problems without directly solving or addressing anything. And then even the facade of happiness I had crumbled to crap when I was laid off.

The world is full of stories where people take some monstrous tragedy and end up saying, "It was the best thing that ever happened to me." I tend to think these people are full of crap. I will say, however, that I think something good is coming out of something bad in that I am using this major setback in life as a reset. I'm giving myself a do-over, but retaining the knowledge that I gained from making so many misguided choices.

I don't know exactly what I'm going to do with my life from this point forward. I've lost a lot of weight, and I'm in the process of working very hard to pay off my credit card bills, so those are first steps to cope with some of the symptoms of the deeper problems I need to grapple with. I want to do something that involves human relationships more. I want to do something that lets me be myself more, enjoy my life more.