Apologies to Samuel Beckett

In deciding on a title for my musings, I remembered a wonderful play I read in college entitled "Waiting for Godot," by Samuel Beckett. It was a complex character study, full of beautiful language and subtle imagery which is still debated by folks today. That said, the only comparison that can be made between my pedestrian drivel and the Beckett play is the title. Basically, the characters in his play were waiting for someone, and so am I. But my someone is not a shadowy, mysterious literary creation. My someone is a tall, funny talk show host.
I first became a fan of Conan O'Brien way back when his original Late Night show premiered. I was young, in college, and used to the talk show hosts my parents had watched. I grew up watching Johnny Carson and figured there would never be another like him. The surprising decision to give an unknown writer a chance to do late night talk was something I just had to see for myself. Conan was an irreverent and unpolished breath of fresh air, and I was instantly hooked.
Over the years my life grew and altered as lives often do....I left college and joined the working world, got married, started a family. And yet somehow Conan always stayed a constant in my life. Babies tend to bring many late nights, and since we ended up with three kids, sleep was often a just nasty rumor to me. Conan kept me company while I changed wet diapers and soothed croupy coughs, calmed nightmares and laundered sheets. Later, my husband began a job working swing shift, which meant he arrived home a little after midnight every night. It became a ritual of ours for him to come wake me, and we'd spend some much needed quality time having snacks and laughing at "Late Night."
We had evolved into having a more human schedule when Conan finally took his long-awaited spot as host of the Tonight Show. We watched and laughed and marveled at this funny man and his crazy ways. It seemed like we were just settling into a routine with him when the most astounding thing happened. Through a series of really bad business decisions, he was forced to leave his show. Not just any show, The Tonight Show, the biggest of all the BIG shows. It was crazy! It was unfair!! Yet, it happened. I had experienced the loss of other well loved TV figures before - as a child of television, I can probably recite chapter-and-verse the plot-lines and characters of most 70's and 80's sitcoms, all the while struggling to remember my cousins' names....(Just kidding, Marcia and Greg!).... But this felt different. Somehow, this "show business as usual" struck a chord in me that resonated far past disappointment or even anger... This move, this one network mess-up was a slap in the face to all the underdogs of the world, all the hard-working and earnest folk who do a good job and still get screwed over. This was more than a change of programing, this was an insult to the idea of fair play and good sportsmanship. What this became, in my ever churning and burning mind, was an example of all the times that the bad guys got to win. I seethed! Not this time!! This time, I wanted vindication, I wanted revenge....and I wanted Conan O'Brien back!
But was I the only one who felt this way? Would I be standing alone in my puddle of righteous indignation? Happily, as I was discover, I was FAR from being the only one.... Instead of being a lonely foot soldier, I found myself marching in a vast army! One full of soldiers just as mad and as hopeful as myself.....One that made me believe in the power of being kind. But that story will have to be told tomorrow. As I am learning, a lot of good can come from waiting.....