A Wish for Ashley

After an emotional weekend, I was absolutely thrilled to look up listings on tvguide.com for this evening and to find out it’s the season premiere of The Amazing Race.   If you haven’t ever since this ingenius reality show/ competition, I strongly recommend you turn on CBS on a Sunday evening.  Maybe you’ll be amused by the road blocks and detours that essentially force show participants to give up any semblance of dignity, or perhaps you’ll be entertained to see how relationship dynamics play out (dating couples, married couples, brother/sister, father/son pairs) when teams are put under immense (artificial) pressure. As a former student of anthropology, I believe this show is worthy of an ethnography in itself.  Whatever draws you in, it’ll only take one episode for you to become a devoted fan.

Now for me, The Amazing Race serves not only as a compelling television viewing experience, but also as a unique bridging experience.  You see, when the show first aired way back in the day, Sister 2 and I saw it and immediately came to the same conclusion: we would be incredible on this show.  We have the personality, the insane banter and the gimmick they look for when casting the teams (our ‘sub title would probably be ‘Mixed Sisters’) and between the two of us, we could out-strategize, out-run and out-wit pretty much anyone else who might ever go on the show.  However, Sister 2 and I didn’t jump on the computer to sign up.  No, no, we’re smarter than that.  If we want to go on the show and win, we need to research, so for the past 7 seasons of the show, we’ve done just that.

While Sister 2 and I live states away from each other, you’d never know that when The Amazing Race is on.  We watch the show “together” by sending text message reactions, phone conversation strategic reflections during commercial, and engaging in end-of-show debriefs.  Through our weekly thought exercises, we’ve determined who would take on which road blocks (she would do anything having to do with eating, I would do things involving heights or memory puzzles) and how we would choose between detours.  Other teams might need a minute of think time, but we know when we’re on the show, our decisions will be instantaneous and on point.  We are well trained.  

Above all, we know we would win because we feed off each other’s ideas and energy… to the point that it builds into a ridiculous confidence that no one would ever question.  We find humor even in stressful situations, we find ways to look at each situation from another perspective and we don’t take ourselves too seriously.  The very same qualities that will one day prompted the Mixed Sisters to cross the finish line and win the million dollar prize are the same qualities that make me confident we will find Ashley.  Because even though this search is stressful, we’re making each other laugh.  Even when a situation makes us feel like we’re at a dead end, we find a new way to approach getting the word out about her.  And above all, we don’t take ourselves too seriously… in the next couple of months I’m sure you will agree with that.

With love (and elation that this season premiere is 2 hours long!!),
Audra