First it was Guiding Light, then As The World Turns and now All My Children and One Life to Live. Daytime fans just can’t catch a break. Moving in are more talk shows and more reality shows. Do we really need more of that junk? And let’s not insult us by announcing to the world that it’s due to low ratings. Come on, we aren’t stupid and we aren’t buying it. It’s about the money and it always will be. Which leads me to the question of how did these shows survive lean times in the past 50 - 60 years? We went through bad economic times in the past. How many of us got through most of it by losing ourselves in our stories. So what’s happened since? They haven’t lost the fans – they are loyal as ever. And with the Tivo and DVR’s available to us I believe there are more viewers now than ever before. So I ask again –what has changed?

I guess it could be that with the addition of DVR’s we aren’t watching the commercials and the advertisers aren’t happy. Or can it be that the unions have so much power that the costs of overhead have gone out of control. Or maybe it’s someone at the network with way too much power. Or maybe it was us, the fans, complaining to the networks when things didn’t go the way we wanted and the network “powers-that-be” just got sick of us.

Whatever the reason we are losing our favorite shows and with that we are losing some of our best friends. Yes, of course I know these characters aren’t real but they have been in our homes, for many of us, most of our lives. We could count on them in the rough times and during the good times. We celebrated holidays with these folks as much as with our own families. We celebrated weddings, many times multiples to the same people. We watched child actors grow into our beloved adult characters. We never had to watch reruns. That was actually what I liked best about daytime TV. I absolutely hate reruns. Our shows were there everyday no matter what. Sure sometimes the stories were repetitive and silly – you all know which ones I’m talking about – but they were there for us no matter what.

The loss of these shows is like losing a best friend and I hate it. I guess I hate the most that the fans, cast and crew are treated without any respect. It’s a business to the networks (I get that) but they don’t get that it’s more than that to us. And if they do “get it” and they just don’t care well then we can stop caring about buying products from their advertisers.

Over the past 12 years that we have done this event we have been so honored to have made friends with so many wonderful actors from all these shows. I can’t tell you how gracious they have been with all the fans year after year. We cannot thank them enough and we will continue to support them wherever they go.

Now what happens to these great people? Where do they go next? They have lost their jobs and are devastated. Many of them have had these jobs for most of their lives. From what I know of them they are strong and will survive this mess. Many will probably get better jobs and good for them.

What happens to the fans? Where do we go? We got dumped too. I guess I have a few thoughts. Maybe the web-series can take off? No doubt it’s the wave of the future for us. Maybe Net-flix or Direct TV will invest in some daytime programming? Personally I hope they do and eventually we won’t need these network big-wigs and they will lose their jobs too. So my future support will be in this direction. Anything we as fans can do to help these shows get established is a plus for all of us. We will have more power if we band together.

Do I sound angry? Darn right I am!