When I think about the little handful of sweet, heartwarming moments scattered in with the disconsolate strangeness, the word I keep thinking of is "grace notes." In music, a grace note is a little flicker of a note that's only there for less than a moment, adding the subtlest lilt and twist to the melody's forward march. In other contexts, it's any little flash or change that alights on our experience and recasts it for that instant of an instant.

Here, I'm thinking of those meanings but I'm also thinking of "saving grace." This place we ended up in is an exquisite wreck, and Lynch won't really save us from it - not now, and maybe not ever. But for me, that actually makes it more precious to think about Coop saying "100%!" or "I AM the FBI" (or even "Pass me those sandwiches"). It tells me he knew something (if not everything) of what was at stake when he said his heartfelt goodbye to Janey-E and Sonny Jim, made sure they got a "Dougie" back, and sent him back through their door as promised.

It's a dark sky with points of light. And I do appreciate that. Lynch may not be getting soft in his old age, but he does have a heart. Someone who didn't could never have created this.