Okay, I’ll let you in on a little secret: whenever a big deadline is approaching, I have this habit of binge-watching Netflix. Classic procrastination, right?
Sure, but for me, it’s more like hitting the reset button. I empty out all my thoughts before diving back in full force. Not exactly the best coping mechanism, but that’s what I do.
So this Friday, I binged on the entire series of Sirens. Have you seen this new series with Kevin Bacon as Peter Kell, a billionaire and CEO of Kell Securities, and Julianne Moore as Michaela “Kiki” Kell, his second wife?
To be honest, I wasn’t impressed with Molly Smith Metzler’s dark comedy based on her play, Elemeno Pea, that explores themes of gender, power, and social class. I found myself pretty bored until right near the end…
…when Simone DeWitt, Michaela’s personal assistant, is stripped of the identity she’s built so carefully for herself.
That was my favorite scene—the moment you can see all life drain from her face. She sits like that, lifeless, throughout a car ride after Michaela fires her. Then suddenly something flips inside her. She gets out of the car and starts running down the road like her life depends on it.
Then there’s her sister, Devon, who chooses to go back to Buffalo (yes, Buffalo, NY!) with their demented father instead of staying together with Simone. She’d rather stick with her bleak reality—and her pity party—clinging to the victim role, her lifelong identity.
Watching Devon’s choice really got me thinking: how often do we choose familiar pain over unknown possibilities? Holding on to the sad stories we tell ourselves about who we are.
Simone’s moment is a powerful leap into an unknown future that can only be better than her past. Devon, on the other hand, resists a future filled with light, choosing instead to cling to her dark past and the victim role she’s made part of her identity.
It then hit me, isn’t the identity we choose to cling to really just a coping mechanism?