Dawson — the Boy at the Window

There was a time when the world didn’t buzz in your pocket every thirty seconds. A time when notifications weren’t Instagram likes, but stolen glances in the hallway or during gym class. There was a time when you asked your best friend to take a picture of the boy you liked, just so he wouldn’t realize you were the one crushing on him. Then we printed those photos and kept them like little treasures inside our diaries, alongside the faces of our ’90s and early-2000s idols, Dawson among them.

It was also the time when you had to be home on time. Not for Netflix, not for reruns. Because the episode of Dawson’s Creek started and that was it. If you missed it, you really missed it.

Who among us didn’t dream of living in Capeside, sleeping with the window open, hoping someone would climb up a ladder?

Dawson Leery taught us the art of daydreaming. His passion for cinema wasn’t just a hobby: it was his greatest dream, his obsession. And we, sitting on our beds with the remote in hand, dreamed with him, imagining our lives could also have a movie soundtrack.

Team Dawson or Team Pacey?

The blond dreamer or the rebellious boy with a golden heart?

Team Joey or Team Jen?

The girl next door or the troubled beauty from New York?

And then there were the others: Jen’s strict but wise grandmother; Jack, whose humor softened even the hardest moments; Andie, fragile yet strong.

Episode after episode they became a little piece of us. Meanwhile the Smemoranda turned into our secret diary, where we wrote everything we didn’t dare to say out loud. And then, that theme song “Anouarauei”, or at least that’s how we sang it, for forty minutes we could stop being invisible and live somewhere else.

Dawson, the character who made us dream when the world was slower, remained in the drawer of adolescence memories.

And James Van Der Beek, the man who gave him a face, moved forward building his family with his wife and six children, sharing even his hardest moments. He spoke about his battle with cancer and his pain with a gentleness only that blond boy at the window could have, reminding us of something simple: we all deserve love.

I don’t wanna wait for our lives to be over.

I want to know right now what will it be…