We are all grabbing for the box of tissues…
My friends always called me the Carrie. I watched HBO Max’s reboot of Sex and the City and I felt like I was watching myself….just like I felt all those years ago when I was just a preteen watching late night episodes in my childhood bedroom when I SHOULD have been fast asleep.
The Carrie. I am the Carrie.
Confession before we go any further: As a child, I would pretend to be asleep and just when I knew everyone was sleeping, I would wake up, lay at the foot of my bed and watch the latest episode of Sex and The City dreaming and wishing (like so many others) to live in Manhattan and live out my best Carrie Bradshaw life.
The clothes, shoes handbags…Oh my goodness the outfit inspiration I took away from every episode was monumental! Carrie’s closet was #goals and watching her type away on that big, bulky laptop in her little apartment storing her sweaters in her stove? Basically my (unintentional) life right now, but I see no coincidence.
We all have our Mr. Big….
I will just stop while I’m ahead and just leave that phrase there for any of you reading this to just reflect because that sentence just hits me in a way that I can’t talk about right now.
Currently I am typing this blog post with my airpods in my ears blaring the Sex and The City filmscore to make this post extra sentimental and feel some “Carrie-Spiration” because I am heavily in my feels about this reboot and I’m not sure why THIS show above all of the other reboots has me like this.
Sure, I love a good reboot, but this one just hits me different and I think it’s because I feel like I am right back where I started, just like Carrie.
I know that may not mean much to you who is reading this, but I feel like I went through a journey similar to Carrie (spoiler alert-maybe?) we are RIGHT back to where she started, just as I feel like I am back to where I started.
There are many days where I sit back and wonder “What all of this was for if I would just end up where I am now?” What was the purpose of the pain? What was the purpose of the the heartbreak and confusion? Although Carrie’s loss is in a different aspect, I can imagine she is having the same thoughts.
The difference between she and I is that my story of coming full circle ended in happiness, while hers ended in loss.
We have all seen this Carrie before. We know her on this level and we have essentially grown WITH her, but we haven’t seen this side of her post a heartbreak that is finalized without any hope of it showing up at her penthouse apartment door…
The only difference this time is that we are seeing her from an older lens.
The viewers are older. Carrie is older and has experienced loss in a way that we have not experienced with her yet, kind of like the people who have been the viewers of our life, right?
The people who have watched us grow and have grown with us may have never experienced us “post major life shift” and have absolutely no idea what to do. So what do they do? They just stop watching. They go down the list of trending series on HBO and binge another program because they just aren’t willing to accept our reboot. Why? because it isn’t going the way they envisioned it to go.
Hits you right in the heart, right? I’m currently fogging up my blue blockers because this couldn’t be more parallel to my life right now. As I rewatched And Just Like That for the millionth time last night (hoping for a new ending to episode one) this message I’m sharing with you all became SO clear to me.
The story is not mine to rewrite. In fact, I didn’t write it AT ALL. This story is not mine, it’s Carrie’s.
In case no one has ever told you, your story is not for anyone else to try to rewrite. In fact, they didn’t write it AT ALL. Your story is not anyone else’s, it’s yours.
You may be a certified people pleaser with the badge on the bottom of your email to prove it, but I promise that can easily be erased by hitting the backspace a few times. I know you have probably been conditioned to believe that you live for everyone else and the story they wrote for you is “More important” because they have “Been there since the beginning.”
I promise the story, your story, that you write yourself, has FAR greater meaning than the one those around you are trying to write.
So, I will say this as bravely as I can, I’m sad for the loss of a great character who we all grew to love and I wish Carrie’s story turned out differently. Will I stop watching the reboot because it didn’t go the way I planned? Hell no! Carrie needs our love now more than ever.
So, I ask you who may have changed the channel because the series didn’t turn out the way you envisioned it…is it worth not following along the journey? After-all, you’ve been invested all this time. Don’t you want to know how it all ends?
In parallel to my life, to you who changed the channel because my reboot didn’t turn out the way you envisioned it…is it worth not following along my journey? After-all, you’ve been invested all this time. Don’t you want to know how my story ends?
I promise you as I type this, I needed this message just as much as you did, if not more. If it took the Sex and The City reboot to teach me this lesson, it wouldn’t be the first time I take advice from THE Caroline “Carrie” Marie Bradshaw and it won’t be the last.”