As Mad Men drew its riveting second season to a close, the world as these characters knew it was coming to an end — both inside and outside of Sterling Cooper. The fears and uncertainties caused by the Cuban missile crisis gave rise to folks getting their lives in order, either by correcting the wrongs of their pasts, growing into the adult they have been pretending to be or confessing a secret and releasing the hidden burden they have been carrying. As death loomed, so did the promise of new life. As confession healed, it also tormented. As power was attained, it was also lost. And the man we've known as Don Draper has accepted that he and Dick Whitman are two sides of the same coin, realizing that his hope (and the hope for the rest of these characters) to see tomorrow rests on finding that comfortable middle ground between the two extremes.
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