Goodbye, Oakdale

I can't stop crying. Seriously. I keep losing it every time I turn on the TV. I just watched The Early Show's retrospective of As the World Turns, which goes off the air today after 54 years. I've been in denial about this day for months. I kept thinking some deus ex machina would swoop down and sponsor the show after Proctor & Gamble pulled the plug ( like Margo did when her stepdad had a terminal illness).

No such luck.

The Bold & the Beautiful is just too ridiculous for me to take to, so I'm left up the TV creek without a paddle.

But between the tears, I did manage to write a couple of pieces that sum up why I loved the show so very much.

Check out my humorous slideshow over at Salon, where I detail life lessons learned from a daily dose of ATWT.

Then on the Huffington Post, I talk about how the show impacted me as I moved from a gawky pre-teen to a successful career gal, all the while looking for cues from the show's themes, characters, and storylines.

Goodbye, Oakdale. You have been loved and you will be missed.

(Video: a recent tearjerker: Barbara's wedding to Henry, in which all the key players are haunted by the specter of Bab's ex and Henry's father James Stenbeck.)