Loss

Tonight, I thought of something I hadn't thought of before.

Americans are very much about gain. About acquisition. About getting. More.

Yet all of our great stories are about loss.

Scarlett and Rhett.
Rosebud.
Titanic.
Zhivago and Lara.
The Third Man.
9/11.
Pearl Harbor.
Ordinary People.
Custer's last stand.
Casablanca.
Anatevka.
Tom Joad in The Grapes Of Wrath.
Grey Gardens.
Jack and Kelly in Castaway.

American television has also timed its commercial breaks to correspond quite exactly to the time it takes me to smoke a cigarette.