“And So It Begins” (“Grab It” Recap)

In and of itself, tonight's Alex story wasn't really that interesting. But, as a single step on a thousand mile journey...

(OK. I doubt the journey's really going to be that long. But at least it's going somewhere.)

I don't know if I'd say I was getting worried when Alex said she was going to take a business class at a community college, but it did feel like she was going to take a potentially big step backward by maybe abandoning CalTech for a far lesser school. I know a little about this – the two years I spent many years ago at a community college were much easier than high school – basically I was an Alex there (in high school I was in the middle of the pack).

So I did breathe a bit of a sigh of relief when she mentioned at the book signing she was still pursuing a degree at CalTech. I'll get back to her question to the author in a moment.

And then at the end Alex made the announcement about starting that barista job. It did turn out that Claire did nudge her a little bit into it, but there was also a bit of self-revelation by Alex that maybe she needed to step out of her comfort zone a little bit. I hope she doesn't step too far out (i.e. I still hope she doesn't give up her dreams), but it will be interesting to see how this story develops.

As I said this morning, though, it may be a while before we actually see that story about her new job. And, as I've said before, hopefully when it happens they'll keep the rest of her family out of it for the most part.

But the rest of her story with Claire tonight felt flat, especially with a disappointing lack of warmth in their final scene. That scene was begging for Alex and Claire to hug each other at the end.

And while normally I'd have tons of sympathy for Alex when one of her family members goes off the deep end and embarrasses her, I do wonder why she even brought Claire into this in the first place (other than the obvious setup to have Claire misinterpret Alex).

And, until the very end, the story was more about Claire than Alex.

And what happened to the side story involving Alex and Haley? Unless Haley really is starting a new (nine-to-five) job (and actually I think she meant 9 PM – 5 AM as in the hours she keeps with what she's been doing this fall), I didn't see where Alex had much influence on her choices.

But there appears to be one other bright side to tonight – it looks like Alex is over her bout of mononucleosis.

Alex's Line Of The Night: ”Anyway, I'm a biochemistry major at CalTech, but your book got me thinking about a business career, and now I'm considering double majoring, but, is that taking on a little too much?”

Hmm. It took almost three years, but maybe the therapy session(s) Alex went through are starting to sink in? That is highly unusual for Alex to think she's taking on too much of an academic load.

So does everything that happened tonight mean the beginning of a left turn for Alex's life? Stay tuned.