Next Up: BOOKS!

It was pointed out to me by my lovely wife that I’m pinching off my thoughts in these blogs. (She obviously didn’t phrase it like that, that’s a me phrasing.) She has a point. I have this internal monologue that—even knowing no one is really reading these—tells me to edit and keep concise my thoughts even to the point of leaving people with questions. I explained to her that I feel like I ramble enough to generate entire theses length papers on inane topics. She lovingly pointed out that I’m a writer and that’s to be expected. It made me giggle. (I’ve been doing it my whole life. Anne Shirley said it best, “I know I talk too much, but I am really trying to overcome it, and although I say far too much, yet if you only knew how many things I want to say and don't, you'd give me some credit for it.” When LM Montgomery created Anne, I wonder if she knew she’d be such an important character to so many people a century after she wrote her.)

Perhaps it’s the air in me, but often my thoughts flit away to tangents seemingly unconnected. Despite my brain seeing those strings clearly, I know most others don’t. So, if you’ll indulge me, I’ll try harder to show the connections at the expense of a little extra rambling. When trying to find some thread with which to string this blog together, I landed on things that have shaped me into the person I am. I find it easiest to talk about the fictional items on the list so, as you can see, that’s where we are beginning. I obsess over things. I find something I enjoy, and I latch on a bit like a tick. That’s a gross analogy but it feels apt to the tendency of my brain to hyper fixate. I want to know everything. It is easy to lose myself for days in research and/or reconsuming the media to catch every detail of everything. I’ve done it ad nauseum with most things I’ve loved.

I’m curious to the point of exasperation. I want to know why. Why do people do the things they do? What’s the hidden motivation? What’s the obvious motivation? Are they the same? If they are different, what causes the differences? Why do people behave the way they do? Why do they believe the way they do? Why do I believe the way I do? Is it just tradition or have I measured my beliefs as worthwhile to me and that’s why I believe them? My brain is in constant motion. Watching and wondering and making up stories for strangers on the street. Why is that person scowling? Is this person’s energy unpleasant all the time or are they having a bad day? What made that baby laugh so joyfully?

It’s rare that I’m not lost in some reverie or another at nearly every moment in the day. I’ve been like this my whole life. I got in trouble in school on a regular basis for being distracted, or the teacher assuming I was distracted, when I was paying attention. It often embarrassed them when I would be able to parrot back to them exactly what they said when called out. Situations like that, while I would like to pretend were regular, were on the rare end of the spectrum. Most times I was, in fact, caught out lost in a daydream. I lived a very active imaginary life. I could be anyone I wanted to be, do anything I wanted to do, and go anywhere I could imagine. I let my mind take me there, wherever that was, flying free. Something happens as we age though. It’s a magic we let go of, bit by bit, until it takes more effort to call the fantasies back up than most people are willing to exert. A life mundane overrides the magic of imagination.

I’ve lived so many lives in my imagination that I sometimes find myself wondering who I actually am. I buy quirky little self-discovery books, hoping to uncover myself. As if I’ve played some epic game of hide-and-seek and my real self is just waiting to be found. It’s nonsense of course. Not to want to know oneself, but to think there’s a magical secret self I can reveal with enough introspection. I’m far too self-aware to pretend that there’s a depth to uncover. I know exactly who I am. Now, for many, introspection is necessary work. A lot of people don’t think deeply about every single little thing. I’ve been told enough over the course of my life that I’m super weird to know that the average Jo(e) doesn’t spend as much time analyzing things as I do. I’ve surrounded myself in adulthood with a lot of folks who are like me, but they also have been told repeatedly about how “not normal” they are, so I guess birds of a feather…

I think books have held so much sway over me is because I can see the whole picture. A movie, or television show, or song only shows you the perspectives that the creators want you to see. Authors, at least the ones I’ve loved, give you the whole puzzle. It’s up to you to put the pieces together. And sometimes the pieces are blank and need you to color them in, but they are there. The whys and hows of characters are all there laid out on the page or woven around the words. If I leave with questions, they are answered with my own interpretations or in further books in the series. They aren’t there because a producer interfered or because the composer only wanted you to see their side.

Nearly a thousand words later and guess what’s coming in the next series of posts? Works of art. Just kidding. Books, obviously. You didn’t need all these words to tell you that the next two posts are going to be about influential books in my life, but it’s what you got. Leave it to a Ravenclaw to use a thousand words when “Next up: BOOKS!” was more than sufficient. You’re welcome and I’m sorry.