Pick up your guitar and sing a song to your kids after dinner (that you ate together). Go help a neighbor mend a fence.

rlwesty, where do you live? The Little House on the Prairie?

It’s nice to have my point made better by others: Survey says: IN “Little House” days, a majority of music was made in homes by folks who lived there. Now we rely on others – mostly pop icons to make our entertainment for us. Dinners: Eaten together. Every day. Neighbors: Helped whenever the need arose – which was often enough. And, you know, it still works today. Just try some “Little House” therapy. It’s a great cure for what ails you. And it’s free. And you might start by reading “Little House” out loud to a friend or housemate.

(I don't have a 'lover' (gag), rlwesty, to read a book to. And I don't have a guitar nor would the kids appreciate a singalong on same after a nice home-cooked meal. What commune do you live on? Yeesh, what squicky comments.)

I have only watched the Sopranos sporadically, but have always read about what was happening on the show (having a real life and all, rlwesty) and was waiting with suspense just like everyone else for the ending.

The reason Tony wasn't killed off - isn't there supposed to be a Sopranos movie of some sort coming up, much as Sex and The City is supposed to have a movie? Maybe that's why he was left alive.

While I've been accused of seeing images in the clouds when it comes to finding symbolism in stories, here's my humble take on the final scene of the finale:

Tony is sitting in a diner, suspicious of all those around him. There are the guys in the booth and at the counter who presumably are out to whack him. The black kids depicted as some sort of threat. The deceptive lookalike snapshots of his sister and even Christopher walking in through the door. Meadow parking the car and crossing the street, seemingly about to be victimized in some way. All these images represent things Tony fears, things he has anxiety about.

The whole scene unfolds according to the way Tony perceives his environment. He is a man trying to surround himself with family, but there is tension building around him. This tension is self-created. And after all, this is a show predicated on the idea of a mobster seeking therapy to get in touch with the way he feels about himself in the world. But what I think Chase is trying to convey here is that amidst at atmosphere teeming with tension, the only true source of evil is the big goomba sitting in the booth with his family. Tony, and Tony alone, is the sole individual in this diner who is capable of the malice that he fearfully perceives in others.

The Journey song, "Don't Stop Believin'" mirrors this reality. The lyrics, "Dont stop believin, Hold on to the feelin," convey Tony's inability (after years of therapy) to make the simple connection between the immoral actions he lives out and the rotten way he feels inside. After all this time, he maintains the same depressive nature he began with, and this same story of his life will "go on and on and on and on."

Despite his continued longing for a simpler life, as we glimpse once again through Tony's serene breaths raking the leaves under a country sky (like we glimpsed at the start of this season at the lake), Tony will not change - cannot change. This wretched fate is Tony's destiny.

You cant’ only look at one show, you have to look at the past two seasons to see what it was all leading up to, and in that regard it was satisfying and also incredibly cynical.

As always, the Italians are dying out – the tour bus guide tells us – and swarms of Chinese are taking over the world.

Tony can’t do anything about that. All he can do is worry about his family.

We were led to believe that Tony’s getting shot last season was the event that gave him a “new lease on life,” but it wasn’t – it really was being holed up in a safe house with a machine gun propped over his gut that got him thinking. So last night’s episode, while rather slow and short on the pyrotechnics, was about protecting his family and wrapping up loose ends. Because he had a 90% chance of being indicted, and probably going to prison.

He He got some money for Bobby’s kids out of Junior, and gave him a shred of dignity to live on by reminding him of the glory days. He shared some real feelings about his mother in front of Carmella (with some random shrink and Melfi substitute – OK, a little too convenient). He rubbed out Phil (with the help of Agent Harris – that was the one scene that took me for a loop: where did that desk-pounding celebration come from?)

And the show let us know that things would be OK in Tony’s absence: He made sure AJ would give up his dream of saving the world, and channeled his energy into working on shlocky movies. Meadow would earn triple figures defending low-lifes, and she won’t get pregnant any time soon. She is free to bang up cars while parallel parking all she wants. And Carmela can continue selling over-priced vacation condos to rich people. In the end, we see that protecting your family means aspiring to be nothing less than a normal, Bush-era, self indulgent American family. As viewers we’re implicated in rooting for this to happen, for them to be participating in a society that is even more warmongering and materialistic than when the series began. Boy, I don't feel so good.

Oh, and the guy in the diner went to take a leak.

This is brilliant and brilliantly written. Kudos to your terrific critic. She nailed it, she nailed us.