“For Better or For Worse” comic strip came to an end on Sunday, August 31, and I cried. It was very poignant, but also it made me realize how the time had passed and will pass. I started reading “For Better or For Worse” when we moved into this house, when our daughter was 2 years old and the character Elizabeth was about the same age. In yesterday’s strip, Lynn Johnston wound it all up, after 28 years, and spun it forward so that we could know what would happen in the future to this family. I wept at the end.
Even though they were only lives on paper, I had become so involved, and could see so many of my own experiences in those strips, and I knew, there at the end, all of us will have to wrap it up one day. Although Lynn Johnston will rerun the strip, we don’t get to do that with our life. As I tell my students, this is not a dress rehearsal. You get one chance, no reruns, no do overs. Make it count.
I cried too. I grew up with the kids of the strip and out of all the comics, For Better For Worse was always my favorite.
It was also one of my favorites. I missed Sunday’s paper, so I am glad that I was able to read about it on your blog. We all need to remember the message you say to your students.
I’ll agree that this was a great comic. I enjoyed reading it every day. My son, however, was “woo-hooing” over the fact that it was over!
Yeah, I cut out that last strip and put it in a page protector between a couple of my FBoFW books.
Our local paper has decided not to carry the ‘new-runs’ of For Better or for Worse.
I still read the Strip Fix every morning at the website.
http://www.fborfw.com/index.php
in fact, one time when I wrote a comment at the Coffee Talk, my name was chosen at random to win a very nice coffee mug and an autographed card from Lynn J herself!
I’m just a little bit older than Liz, and I can see so much of my family in Lynn’s fictional one! I would give cutouts with notes to my parents ALL THE TIME.