Mad Men Series Finale

Light spoilers, sorry. But as we like to say around here,

Never lose an opportunity for a teaching moment.

If you haven't seen it, have no intention to see it, assume you'll never see it, reconsider.

To enjoy this last of the Mad Men season, the AMC Mad Men Series Finale, you really don't need to know very much about what happened previously.

You probably should know that Don Draper (Jon Hamm) is the mind behind several brilliant television ad campaigns in the sixties and seventies, that he does it all effortlessly, usually under the influence of bottle after bottle of Scotch, and yes, he suffered a dysfunctional upbringing and has secrets, other identities.

You might need to know that his ex-wife Betty (January Jones) is a survivor of an era that objectified women and defined the parameters of their success. Not that this era is over, or that she has ever been a warm and fuzzy stereotypic mother. All of the women in this show, for all seven seasons, are the second-class citizens that feminism seeks to graduate, the heart and soul of the equal rights and women's liberation movement.

You might need to know that Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss) has been raised Catholic and that she steps out of her family script to express herself in advertizing, and that she's never been lucky in love.

Mad Men

And that Joan Harris (Christina Hendricks) has always been the subject of sexual harassment in advertising, for she is stunning, an iconic female, but she will persevere, become a partner in the firm.

 It is the Don Draper story, one that surely can be found on a summary at AMC, that captivates us. We find him in California in this last show, having walked away from his success in New York, disliking the powers and politic of the company buy-out. He has hit the road, in search of what, we're not sure and neither is he. The walking away, the dropping out, searching, is so symbolic of that era, the late sixties and early seventies, and the costumes, the execution of the plot, bring me back, nostalgically, to a time when it was all up for grabs. Everyone could be an adolescent. A pox on your stage theories.

Even the group therapy of the times, we see much of it in this episode, is perfectly rendered as both impossibly ineffectual, and then. . . a work of beauty.  The stories they must have told on that set at lunchtime.

I can't do it, won't give away the ending, or even much of the middle, but suffice it to say that this one show will be, should be required watching, on the syllabus, for those who like the idea of art therapy, of art as therapy. Out of existential conflict, creativity is born, assuming one thinks this way, is trained to think this way. And from creativity, happiness, serotonin surging, surely, and what feels like psychological growth, resolution, not necessarily all in that order.

But because it is so hard to train people to think creatively, this particular season finale of a popular television show is serious business, a commodity, valuable art, a teaching moment, make that hour and fifteen minutes.

Think creatively, or learn to do so, and no matter what happens, we can make something new out of something that is wearing us down, make it better. We are, basically, in charge of that, making it, as the Beatles sing in Hey Jude, Better, Better, Better. Good therapy, can bring us close, but we have to add that final dab of paint ourselves.

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Creative Numbing

Maybe it is aging, but I don't think so. By evening I'm so wiped out physically and emotionally (and it isn't from work, although working can be emotional sometimes) that all I want to do is numb.

You know what that means, right?

For some people it is Spider Solitaire (played for months, nonstop, before realizing I'm addicted! Quit cold turkey).  There are other games, of course.  Think Angry Birds. 

Another way to numb, a personal fave, is exercise, which is recommended by doctors, so it can't be bad. But when you aren't listening to educational tapes, when you pair exercise with television, it could be filed under numbing.

For some, eating is numbing.  Drink and drugs, surely.  Numbing.

I complained to FD about it this morning, told him that it is mortifying to me that my entire evenings have been spent munching black olives and numbing.

"What's that?  What's numbing?" he asks.

Hearing the explanation, behavior that diverts negative affect but wastes time and isn't socially proactive,* he smiles. "Oh! I do that all the time!" He does work a lot of crossword puzzles.

I think of numbing as coping, really. It is a good thing, and it doesn't have to be a waste of time. FD reinforces this thought.  "Be more creative at night.  Creative numbing! I could compose songs, you could help with the  lyrics, write books!  Why don't you write a book, Creative Numbing?  Ask people who read the blog for help!"

It is what we talk about in therapy, creativity as a venue for mental health, an intervention.  Entire schools of therapy, Music Therapy, Art Therapy, exist because creativity is positive energy, life sustaining in its way.  But it is so hard when you're depressed. Creativity sparks the serotonin, gets the wheels going-- it is what some of us call really getting high. How to spark that creativity to spark that serotonin to get those wheels to turn is the million dollar question.

So we are taking suggestions. We'll put it together, write a book, call it Creative Numbing. Everyone gets an acknowledgment, and maybe even gets to write a personal explanation, take full credit for the idea.  I'll say it  right now, if it's about sex, write your own book.

We are still going to need a really good list of numbing behaviors that aren't necessarily creative, too, for comparison.
 
How hard could that be?

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*You heard that definition here first.  It's copyright for the book, of course.