“The Mother We Share” (“Spring Break” Recap)

Another week, another heartbreak for Alex. At least tonight's story was a lot more well done than her story in “Rash Decisions”.

The weird part is the story hit more of the upsides than downsides (though they were too close for comfort to getting into trouble), yet I still felt sad at the end of the night. I guess that's a price to pay for wanting her stories to be dramatic – sometimes she's going to be the bug (vs. the windshield). It's just a shame it's happened to her so many times this season.

There's one obvious scary part about Alex's story tonight – the fact that she was not reluctant to take that drink from Haley really worries me (as if I haven't worried about Alex all year), especially since we know Haley and Claire already aren't afraid to drown their sorrows (or sometimes joys) in alcohol. I hope this is solely a one-off and doesn't turn into a pattern. Alex already has not been in the best of mental states this season – adding alcohol (or other worse substances) to the mix would have serious consequences for her, like her someday hopping into a stranger's van again (another scary aspect of tonight's story that thankfully was cut off quickly – I mean going with a guy named Weasel couldn't possibly lead to trouble, right?).

At least for now Alex dodged a bullet – she didn't get arrested for underage drinking like Haley did in college, which probably would have cost her everything.

Which leads to another pattern I fear we might see: is Alex going to keep getting rejected by all the top schools (even though it's not official, I'm sure Princeton's not going to accept her either)? I hope Haley's right about Alex getting into one of them (she should be), but I'd hate to see her forced to settle for a “last resort safety school” - that's a fear I've had from the start of the year that just got closer to reality.

One bad side effect from “Connection Lost” - somehow Claire was able to figure out the password to Alex's computer???

I suppose there's one bright spot to Alex not getting into Harvard - she won't suffer a fate as bad as Charlie, the hapless Boston subway rider from even before my time (trust me, other than the exit fare not a lot has changed in terms of Boston transit system quality – especially after the winter we just had).

Alex's Line Of The Night: ”Why do things the right way? (Haley: 'Alex, I real...') No! What's the point? Get straight A's for ten years, spend your summers building houses, drag your cello to school every day, write the perfect essay, and for what? 'No thank you, Alex. We don't want you, Alex.'”

That outburst pretty much sums up how life has been for this poor kid all year, and it had me in tears as she was breaking down. Hopefully she reconsiders how she feels because I don't want to see her throw her life down the drain.

Anyway, I have a feeling I'm not done finding my thoughts on this episode – thankfully I still have almost half a vacation to do so.