Jack Bauer is coming between us...

I'm furious. Absolutely livid. Positively seething. Over what, you ask? The first season of 24.

See, I'd always avoided watching the show, even though the previews made it look exciting, and I found the format intriguing (each episode covers one hour of the hero's life, so the 24 episodes in a season cover one day). But no, I said, I don't want to get hooked on a TV show. I spent some of the best years of my life glued to the set instead of living. I was a huge fan of thirtysomething, Cheers, reruns of Gilligan's Island, you name it. I missed way too much of my kids' early years, and I didn't even know it -- or worse, care.

Then one year I gave up TV for Lent. My wife persuaded me it would be good for the family, and it was. I began to look forward to coming home to see her and the kids, instead of the latest episode of Seinfeld; staying up to talk with her, instead of watching reruns of M*A*S*H. Oh, I'd occasionally catch an episode of The Simpsons, or (for the brief time that we had cable) an EWTN show with Fr. Groeschel.

But for the most part I avoid TV shows like the plague. What about Survivor, you ask? I can live without it. Who Wants to be a Millionaire? Not me. Friends, maybe? Who needs 'em? American Idol, perhaps? Nope. "We don't go in for idolatry at my house," I tell people.

So I was a bit surprised when my wife, the same woman who helped free me from the shackles of the Boob Tube, suggested we rent the first season of 24. A friend of hers recommended the show and she wanted to check it out. Really? I said. Sure, she said. Okay, I said. And we proceeded to watch four hours of the most intense, gripping, pulse-pounding who-done-it shows ever made for television. I was hooked. So was she. My son borrowed the entire first season from his friend, and we watched it together, up through the 10 AM to 11 AM hour.

Then she got sick, and I had to take the kids on a campout last weekend without her. And guess what? Tonight she told me she's going to ask our son to borrow the second season from his friend. "But we haven't finished watching the first season," I said. "Oh, um, I have," she said. WHAT?! WHEN?? "Last weekend. I got tired of reading. So I watched the rest of it." Without me. I was stunned. And without asking or even telling me! I was speechless. In fact, she's known how it ends for SIX WHOLE DAYS... and said NOTHING to me!! I'm beyond shocked. I feel betrayed.

I told her I'm going to stay up all night tonight and watch the rest of it. "And be non-functional tomorrow?" she asked. What's the alternative? She offered to tell me how it turns out. She doesn't understand that half the fun of a show like this is watching it unfold and trying to figure out what's going to happen before it does. Who Jack can trust and who he can't. Will his wife and daughter and David Palmer live, or die? Will Jack be forced to become what he most hates? "You know," she said, "it drags sometimes, they really draw it out." Yeah, so? Lots of good stories do that. It's called building suspense. "Don't complain to me that it drags!" I yelled. That's like telling a one-eyed man it's no fun to watch a 3-D movie because the glasses feel funny. But you saw the depth effects, right?

I realize this is all old news for most, if not all of you. But I'm caught in Jack's web of intrigue and feel like my guts have just been ripped out... by the person I thought I could trust the most. And it's killing me. I hate that I'm so angry about this, but I can't help it.

By the way, don't tell me any details about how the first season turns out. Or future seasons, for that matter. I want to find out for myself how Jack makes it through his day. Even if I have to do it alone.

UPDATE: Okay, I've cooled off. Got over my upset -- unlike Jack Bauer, I was able to sleep on it. I decided it would be better to have the Coupon Queen tell me all about the show -- even though she has a notoriously bad memory for details about such things as movies and TV. As she said, it's good practice for her.

She told me about what happened up until the 10 PM hour, which, she said, is when the series really goes into overdrive. (I found this a little difficult to believe, having watched the first 11 hours of it... but decided to take her word for it.)

So tonight we watched the last two episodes of season one together, and I have to say, I was completely blown away by the last two hours. Not to mention, she actually did a good job of filling in what happened between 11 AM and 10 PM, so I had to ask very few questions.

And, I must confess, I grieved with Jack at the end. I watched the alternate ending, where Jack's wife Terri lives, and while it was nice to see them all reunited, safe and sound, still... it didn't have the same emotional impact. Tragedy has a way of uniting us to a character in a way that triumph just can't. You know, maybe that's why we can identify with a Savior who had to die for our sins. Because we know, we absolutely know, that He faced the same things we do, that He can identify with us, and that ultimately, He loves us enough to go through death with us.

And that is no small thing.