Late rising this morning because it is a holiday here so I
decided last night I was going to really enjoy myself with my new friends and
old ones brought together by our mutual love for the TV show Scandal. Gladiators
through and through under the stars at our wonderful host’s, Erica Symonds’,
home overlooking the Sound on a picturesque Bermudaful night. Who could ask for
anything more.
The backdrop was to die for as our team of Bermuda Gladiators
assembled to watch the #Scandalfinale. I
dressed in Olivia Pope loungewear – well not exactly but close enough.
Thinking that way if there was any hope of my couple, #Olitz, getting back
together, I was in solidarity with them. Bringing more power into Olivia Pope
to help her make decisions that were good for her and not for everyone else.
Instead I realized something monumental last night after
watching Scandal. Though I was disappointed with the way it ended between Fitz
and Olivia, I knew it could end no other way for now. Olivia for the first time
in her life realized she was allowing herself to be “the help”. Not just for
Fitz and his family but with her Gladiators as well – not us the watching Gladiators
- but her staff at OPA. Everyone looked to her for everything and at first she
needed that to feel connected. To feel needed. To feel important. Because as we
all know, she does not come from the most nurturing family environment.
But over the course of Season 3, Olivia was forced to confront
her own demons. She came to realize she
can’t be everything to everyone else without first becoming everything to herself.
So she decided to run away much to Abby’s chagrin. Abby telling her she could not
just run – gladiators don’t run. But sometimes even the strongest of us all
need to run. To hide. To breathe. To take some time to understand who we are
and what we are.
To decide if it is our mission in life to be “the help” unwillingly
or if we are meant to be “the help” with total authority - embracing who we are
with pride. Without apology. Without needing to justify who we are to anyone but
ourselves. So though Olivia and Fitz did
not even kiss in this episode and though I was thoroughly devastated when Olivia told Fitz about Mellie being raped
by Big Jerry, I knew deep in my heart she did the right thing. She fulfilled
her mission to bring others out of the darkness into the light in a way she
least expected. In a way we least expected.
In doing so, she freed herself from the clutches of the darkness
and moved closer to the light. And it was in that moment that I wished I had worn
my white hat because Olivia totally embraced the white hat when she sacrificed
her relationship with Fitz to allow the truth to come out. She knew if she and
Fitz were ever supposed to be a couple, she had to tell him the one thing that
could make him understand why his wife had turned her back on him. To force Fitz
and Mellie to either take a step toward each other from a place of
understanding or to walk away from each other from a place of understanding.
Olivia knew that if she held onto that piece of information,
she would never know if Fitz really did love his wife. She knew she had to be the biggest one out of
the triangle. The light bringer even if it cost her the love of her life
because what she realized was that if he was really the love of her life, no
matter what news he heard, eventually he would come back to her if he truly
loved her. Knowing that if he did not come back, he never loved her fully.
Freeing them all from the bondage of a secret that kept them tied to the past that was destroying them rather than liberating them. Allowing them to move ahead freely.
Many in my group were disappointed with the ending. Thinking
it fizzled out rather than going out with a bang but I could not see any other
way the Season could have ended. Sometimes life fizzles and it is during these times that we are tested the most. Bangs and explosions are easy ways to make decisions because we are forced to do so by something catastrophic. But when we have to make choices because of mediocrity, that's when it is the most difficult.
To me to see the parallel between the euphoria Fitz felt
some four years before when he was first elected as President to the man totally
breaking down under the strain of what the next four years means for him as the
President, as a man, was heart breaking. Watching him walking alone down the corridor while everyone else was celebrating while he was breaking with every step he took was very telling of the truths he was facing. The demons he was confronting about himself.
And not just because
he is my man, my heart broke for him because he realized because of choices he
had made or did not make but allowed himself to be coerced into making had
culminated in so many people being murdered, maimed and more importantly he
knew he was going to be imprisoned for four more years. The joy of being
President not for him but for everyone else.
Mellie rushing in back in her power, First Lady mode, urging
her broken husband to get up off the floor where he had crumbled realizing all
at once, the one he needed the most, Olivia Pope, was not there. Realizing
without her, he was nothing but it was too late in that moment because she was jetting
down the runway trying to be in the light. To feel the light on her face with
Jake, the man who she feels something for. The man who openly wants to be with
her with no strings attached. But her face tells it all when the phone rings and
I knew it would be none other than Mellie calling her because that’s what Mellie
does, when things crumble, she calls her
husband’s mistress to handle it. To fix it. But not this time.
When Olivia decided to ignore the call at that moment, she
was still torn because her face told it all. Torn between a love that is
possible for her but does not totally fulfill her- Jake sitting beside her. Or the
love that is forbidden but fills her every cell with love. We will see what she
does but something tells me that airplane does not get too far off the ground
before Olivia realizes though she may be “the help”, she is the greatest help
ever. And no amount of running away physically is going to free her
spiritually.
Teaching me that a fulfilled life, a life lived from a place
of truth comes from the choices we make about who we are and who we are not.
And learning to embrace who we are with conviction, forgiveness, compassion and
vulnerability because by doing so, we give ourselves permission to go out into the world as bringers of light rather than
takers.
I think I know how Season four will begin but I don’t know how it will
end but I am ready for Liv to don the white hat with pride and be who she
is. Not who everyone else wants her to be.
I am ready for the break now from Scandal because I know
love is always the answer we are seeking. It is what brings us into the light. Always
and it starts from a place within and lights our path wherever we go. Happy
break cast, writers, producers and everyone else involved with #Scandal as well
as to my fellow #Gladiators through #Gladiatorsunite and #GladiatorsBda. See
you in September. Remember to breathe….
