Only the Lonely

A month ago, after completing a ten hour marathon viewing of every episode of the American version of The Office, I posted a blog entry entitled “The Best Show on Television” which consisted only of a couple photos of the show’s main characters. At that time I was emotionally spent after the marathon, a night in which I found myself crying at two different junctures. I have cried less than half a dozen times in the past ten years, so it came as a shock that a one-plus year half hour comedy about a Scranton, Pa paper supply company branch could move me with such devastating force.

The first tears I shed that evening were tears of laughter. A clever plot halfway through season two which saw the characters choose and create gifts for a Christmas White Elephant party spiraled into perhaps the funniest episode of television I have ever seen. This plot device provided an uncontrived method for highlighting the eccentricities (some whimsical, some endearing, some absurdly hilarious) of each of the show’s characters. When the episode climaxed in boss Michael’s ridiculous purchase of a video ipod for temp Ryan (a relationship so fascinating it could be analyzed in a blog far larger and more discerning than this), my friends and I finally lost it and the laughter became so violent and the tears so blinding we had to rewind the DVD to see what we had missed.

The second time I cried came near the end of the second season, during a video vignette of the office produced by Michael set to U2’s “With or Without You.” The segment so deftly illustrated the vital aspects of Michael’s character – his whimsical ignorance, ignorant incompetence, passion for life, and, most importantly, ignorant innocence – while doing the same on a micro-level for the other characters, that before I knew it I had been overwhelmed and a few tears had slid onto the couch. The emotion of that moment is actually topped in a couple other moments, especially Jim’s booze-cruise confiding in Michael (perhaps my favorite moment in television fiction history) and a Michael-Jim karaoke duet of “Islands in the Stream” that I watched tonight on NBC.

The Office is certainly the funniest show I have ever seen, with only Curb Your Enthusiasm providing a worthy challenge. But the real reason I once said “On a scale of 1 to 10, The Office is a 10, and no other show is above a 7” (I have never seen the stalwarts Lost and Arrested Development, of which I hear wonderful things and plan to remedy this summer, and realized I might give Northern Exposure at least an 8 on that scale) is because The Office combines the comedy with an extremely subtle (until the Earthshaking season two finale) yet lethal picture of unrequieted love and modern suburban loneliness.

I have dealt with loneliness for most of my life, and it has intensified at times since graduating college and moving to the suburban slog of Westminster (not to mention spending significant time in the jump-fifty-stories-loneliness oasis known as Las Vegas). Most of the time I seek to fight these lonely feelings (and most of the time they are successfully vanquished by a solid foundation of friends and the knowledge that I am poised for a successful and satisfying life). But sometimes I am oddly proud of my loneliness. It is an incongruous romanticism, perhaps a sort of evolutionary wrinkle like the poor being proud of their poverty and virgins celebrating their celibacy. Maybe it is why my favorite movies of the past nine months are The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, Brokeback Mountain, and The Weatherman. Sometimes the loneliness provides an odd, poignant kinship, and makes me feel alive.

Only the lonely
Know the way I feel tonight
Only the lonely
Know this feelin’ ain’t right…

But only the lonely
Know whyI cry
Only the lonely…

Maybe tomorrow
A new romance
No more sorrow
But that’s the chance - you gotta take
If your lonely heart breaks
Only the lonely

- Roy Orbison, “Only the Lonely”

That got a bit out of hand towards the end. I’ve never written a blog entry like this, and I’d appreciate feedback. Especially if you think it was pretentious.

Bottom line: The Office is fucking sweet, and you should watch it.