Living Large In Our Little House

Tonight ends an era for me on tele­vi­sion. The final episode of “24” will play out in a 2-hour series finale that I’m sure will even­tu­ally find a new time on the big screen.

My mother and I began watch­ing it in the fall of 2001 because we like Kiefer Sutherland, and yes, maybe in those months fol­low­ing 9–11, we needed to see an American hero putting some whoop on the bad guys.

As tele­vi­sion became less and less appeal­ing to me with all of the “real­ity” shows that aren’t real, Mom and I stuck with “24.”

When she lived down the road from us, we usu­ally watched it sep­a­rately in our own homes, call­ing each other dur­ing com­mer­cials, replay­ing every last tick-tocked moment and antic­i­pat­ing what would hap­pen next.

We watched it together first in 2004 when Mom was in the hos­pi­tal after her heart attack.

The show even became a way for our German daugh­ter to stay con­nected. They were always a sea­son behind what we were see­ing, but it gave us some­thing to talk about, and the DVD of the sea­son gave us a gift to send at Christmas.

When Mom moved to the senior apart­ment build­ing, I began stay­ing with her on Monday nights after I took her din­ner over and we would watch the show together. Although sur­rounded by more peo­ple, she seemed even lone­lier there and she never wanted me to leave. Watching “24” was still some­thing she enjoyed and one of the remain­ing things we could do together.

In her final weeks while in the hos­pi­tal, we watched the final episodes she would see again in her room. When she didn’t respond to the show that last week, it was one of the first times I acknowl­edged that she prob­a­bly wouldn’t make it.

I remem­ber after the first sea­son that Kiefer Sutherland was hes­i­tant doing a sec­ond. He was quoted as say­ing some­thing to the effect that sequels are never as good as the orig­i­nal and he was afraid of not being able to live up to the great­ness of that first season.

It did, how­ever, by con­stantly intro­duc­ing excel­lent writ­ing, plot lines (it had a black pres­i­dent before we did in real­ity) and act­ing by some fine guest stars.

Although I’ve stuck with it, “24” for me hasn’t been the same since my mother died.

Last sea­son, I finally real­ized that it wasn’t me, the show had gone past its prime, los­ing it’s punch, which is what Kiefer Sutherland was afraid of after the first season.

I con­tin­ued watch­ing it this sea­son, more out of nos­tal­gia than any­thing else. It was the final past time in my life that I enjoyed with my mom and tonight it will also fade to black.

Have you ever stuck with some­thing more out of nostalgia?