True Love

I have absolutely nothing to say, but I know my husband loyally checks in every day to see if there's anything new here, so: Hi, honey! :)

Speaking in the Tongue of Metaphor

I'm feeling metaphoric today...

I have never much been one for bandwagons. I don't like riding on them - they tend to be very crowded and noisy, usually occupied by an abundant supply of fools who haven't got the sense to be much more than lemmings following a trend right over the edge. Somtimes, the bandwagons are perfectly legitimate, but I am just so bandwagon-averse that I refuse to get on, simply on principle (examples: I have never seen Titanic, never watched Lost or Survivor, never finished reading 7 Habits of Highly Effective People). I don't mind driving bandwagons, however. I rather enjoy doing that from time to time, actually. I get to pick out the truck, decide the route, set the pace...and watch the lemmings pile on. That is much more my speed. I just thought I'd mention that. I don't know why.

Why I Love To Read - And Why I Hate It

I have (finally) just completed Heaven and Hell, the third and final book in the North and South series by John Jakes. (Yes, that North and South, the book on which the miniseries starring Patrick Swayze that we all watched in high school was based.) I loved these books (much better than the miniseries) and they were a perfect example of why I love to read.

The writing is, of course, excellent. If it hadn't been, the books wouldn't have been so popular, wouldn't have generated a miniseries, and wouldn't have interested me enough to finish each of their epic volumes of 700+ pages. Jakes manages to use language to the utmost effect: he writes in modern English peppered with 19th-century vocabulary to help you inhabit the time as you read (I had to look up "reticule" to confirm that it refers to those little drawstring pouch-style purses women used to carry). His imagery is vivid and florid without being flower and extraneous. He manages to supply considerable detail not only about the plot and characters but of the time itself, educating the reader about the era and American history, without being pedantic, tiresome, or in my case, condescending to the Civil War-ignorant. I love reading writing that is engaging, just by virtue of the way the words are assembled, regardless of the topic or character portrayals, and Jakes certainly provides that.

In doing this successfully, Jakes' novels represent one of my favorite things about reading: losing myself in another world where I find myself fascinated by the people and places I'm meeting as I go, wanting to know more, and developing an emotional connection to them that make them seem more a part of my actual life than a story I'm reading. But the beauty of North and South (and Love and War, and Heaven and Hell) doesn't stop there; they also managed to teach me something. All that 19th century American history that I could never quite get sunk into my thick skull in school came to life for me in an altogether new way. Granted, the miniseries helped me get a bit of perspective by feeding my 1980's, TV-raised adolescence with visual imagery to help the information stick. But it certainly didn't educate me the way the novels did. Setting aside for a minute the fact that the TV version had to do the typical degree of "revising" to make the stories, people, and settings more palatable and ratings-worthy - and the fact that some of the more salient points about the objectionableness of slavery were totally glossed over - the novels simply do it better. There is considerably more and substantially richer detail that one's brain can so much more effectively visualize without the aid of television, and an exploration of individual characters' thoughts that TV can't ever quite capture. And although I certainly used some of the actors I remembered from the miniseries as my mental pictures as I read (and completely fabricated others as I would with any novel not made into a TV show), the beauty of reading is in having the mental latitude to take those physical embodiments and do so much more with the character than even the best actor could pull off. Because of that, and directly because of the way Jakes weaves story and history together so seamlessly, I learned more about the Civil War then I could have dreamed possible. So all that said, reading these particular books was a complete joy, and wholly illustrative of the very best of what reading does for me.

That said, I HATE that books like these - and my passion for reading them - becomes so doggone consuming. Like any of my other generally harmless addictions (solitaire, Sudokus, etc.), reading a good book just seems to take over my every thought until the book is done. I read as much as I can, throughout the day, and then I spend my non-reading time thinking about the characters and feeling for them, and wondering what will happen next. But unlike those other harmless pasttimes, it saps all my energy to do this! I not only spend time reading that I could be spending doing something more productive, but I find myself completely paralyzed when I try to sit and write something myself. Somewhere between my obsession with the story I'm reading and my fear that I will inadvertently co-opt the author's style as my own because that's the track my brain is on at the moment, I sit like the deer in the headlights thinking, "Oh $#!%. Now what?" And so the reading task ramps up, because now there's a compulsion to finish the book as quickly as possible so that I can get my life back. As if there was more time I could spend reading. It's madness.

Call it this week's excuse for why I haven't blogged, but there it is, the good, the bad, and the truly evil side of reading a good book. I highly recommend it.

This Week's Excuse(s)

Well, I am happy to report that the Sudoku craze has passed (for me). Although I would still enjoy the occasional swag at those tempting little blocks, I no longer feel a daily compulsion to pass hours of my time solving those particular brainteasers. Of course, as any addict knows, most addictions are broken by replacing the original addiction with another, and so it goes with me. This week, it's online poker.

No, no, I am not a gambling addict. (Yes, hubby, I know that the first step to kicking your addiction is admitting you have a problem.) I have just always loved to play cards, and these rooms that allow you, for free, to play against other actual human beings fulfill a longing deep in my soul. It doesn't hurt that I occasionally win a lot of (play) money off some really foolish betters and my ego skyrockets and I get all woolly inside. Then, just when I start to think, "Gee, I should try playing for real money," I lose a whole bunch of play money, recapture my humility and a sense of reality, and eventually move on to the next big attention-sucker activity, whatever it may be.

So that's why I've been quiet this week (husband, stop laughing at the word "quiet"). I also feel kinda cruddy today, like I'm on the brink of a cold or something, so I don't feel much like doing anything, even playing poker, so you can add that to my list of excuses. And listening to my baby daughter on the monitor, practicing her vocal scales at top volume instead of napping, is a distraction that would prevent even the most brilliantly prolific writer from doing any real work, so there's that. And the fact that for some strange reason, I just don't feel like I have much to say right now. But I wish I did. There's so much going on in the world to comment on...just as soon as I run out of excuses not to...

Sudoku Fever

I caught it. I tried and I tried and I tried to avoid it, but alas, I have caught the fever. And MAN, am I hating it.

At first, I tried to do a puzzle in the paper, decided it was too much like those brainteaser assignments we used to get in grade school, quit, and figured I'd never have to deal with another one. Then all of a sudden, they were EVERYWHERE, those ubiquitous, insipid, obnoxious puzzles, staring me in the face at every turn, hooking people with some draw I just could not fathom. People kept asking me if I was addicted yet. "NO!" I insisted vehemently, and I won't be, 'cause I hate those dadgum things.

Then there they were, infesting my puzzle book of "regular" puzzles like a plague, and I kept passing over them, cursing their very existence. That is, passing over them until one fateful day when I decided to try one, just to make sure that I really didn't like them, and not that I was just afraid of them because they seemed like a math problem. I did one puzzle. And when that didn't take me all day, I did a second one, just to test the theory. And before I knew it, I'd done a whole page. And then another. And now I am HOOKED. Totally and completely, like a drug I can't get enough of, wanting more and more and thinking about them when I'm not doing them. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!

How does that happen? I mean, I know how I got started, but I don't understand how things like video games and Sudoku puzzles can be so very literally addictive. I've had it happen with some of those silly little computer games that MSN puts out - you try one someone sends you a link to, you play it a second time because your ego won't let you stop with that bad a score, and then the next thing you know, you're having a conversation with your boss about how the computer at work is not to be used for personal interests. (No, I've never actually had that conversation with a boss, but I know people who have.) You find yourself making time in the evenings to play a few rounds...which suddenly take you to 3am before you realize what's happened. What is it about these things that draw a person in so completely and captivatingly?

My personal theory is that there's something about the "creating order from the chaos" aspect of these games that is SO satisfying it can overshadow all other facets of our lives which are often chaotic beyond our control. There was a Star Trek: Next Generation episode one time (yes, I went through a phase as a pseudo-Trekkie, and for the record, we prefer the term "Trekker") where this alien race tried to take over the Enterprise by addicting everyone to this game that was played on a futuristic visor using just your mental power and soon everyone was so preoccupied with the game they didn't care what was happening on board anymore, and it took Data the non-human and Wesley Crusher, the kid, to solve the mystery and save the day. Every time I find myself hooked on one of these things, I think about that show. The game as it was portrayed in Star Trek seemed to give a little dose of endorphins each time the player landed a little disc in the hole or whatever, somewhere between taking a hit of something and experiencing a mini-orgasm. I think the satisfaction that solving these puzzles (or mastering these games) brings is a similar effect. And I worry that if I don't quit, the ship will be lost...metaphorically speaking, of course.

So eventually, I know I'll have to just quit cold turkey, because that's the only way to get out of it. There's no winding down; I just have to not play for a few days until the excruciatingly powerful urge to do another one is completely gone. The day will come that I will just have to put down the book - no, burn it probably - and be done with Sudokus for good. But today is not that day. :)

Ah, Blogging.

What a strange new technology this is, blogging. It's like keeping a diary except that people can read it and comment on it. Not that people do, really, but still. It's a place to put my any and every thought, that I can then go back and read later and wonder, "what the heck was I thinking?"

That whole diary-likeness probably explains why I don't do a better job of keeping up with it. I sucked at keeping journals, whether it was for school or personal use. There's no good reason why, other than a simple lack of self-discipline. I love to write, I certainly have a lot to say, and it isn't difficult for me to write, quickly and at length. Yet, inexplicably, I just fall away from doing it once the novelty wears off or I have a day or two in which I don't feel I have anything particularly urgent to say.

I always regret that I don't do it, because I think: what a treasure I would have, especially for my daughter, if I had kept diaries all these years. Then she could read, especially after I'm gone (which I hope won't be for a very long time, but I guess we never know, right?) all about how I felt at her age and what kinds of things I experienced at various times in my life. Heck, it wouldn't hurt me to read once in awhile as a way of gaining perspective on how things that seem like a big deal one day turn out to be nothing at all in the long run, or to see a record of something that happened, written while it was still fresh, compared with my memory of it a year or ten later.

At least the blog sort of nags at me, hanging out there in the ether reminding me in a way a static book hiding in my nightstand does not. I find myself feeling guilty for not writing more, and then relieved when I actually give in to the pressure of the unseen force and just do it. So now even though it's been a few weeks, I can look at the four paragraphs I've just completed and sigh and know that I'm good for a few days again. :)