Posted on April 26th, 2008 by Mark. Categories: My Life.
I’ve been on a “Queen” kick lately. I’m not a huge fan, but they’re damn good and I do enjoy their music. Anyway, me and the wife went to Barnes and Noble today to return a web tutorial that we didn’t need and to smell the paper. Yes, I love the smell of a bookstore… sue me. You people with Kindles … (you know who you are) you’re just wrong! You need to hold a book, feel the paper, take it all in. What’s this reading off of a screen nonsense!? So while we were driving back, “Who Wants To Live Forever” finally comes up in my Queen rotation. It’s from the movie “Highlander” which features the castle where the wife and I got married (Eilean Donan). Being nerds we love that movie… and we marvel each time we see it or hear a song from it because neither of us ever thought we’d visit Scotland, much less get married at the castle that was in that flick. It’s really strange to consider that at 16, I saw the movie and never had the slightest idea that someday I would be GETTING MARRIED there. It’s the same for the wife who also saw the movie in her teens. Weirdness, eh? So here’s some Youtube video with clips from the classically cheesy “Highlander” that features the song.
Posted on April 26th, 2008 by Mark. Categories: My Life.
I never read a book twice. I just can’t bring myself to do it. I know that some people read a book over and over again and find something new in it every time. While I find the whole thing noble, especially given the fact that I like to write… it seems awfully tedious. When I finish a book I might store it on a shelf, in a closet or even in a bookcase… but it may as well have been donated to a library or tossed into the trash. I won’t be flipping through its pages any time soon… or ever.
Until recently, I’d little understanding that I tend to treat life like that. I look at it as chapters, or volumes… parts of a whole work begun and completed. Sometimes an approach like that is warranted, other times (much to my suddenly enlightened dismay) it is not. Just because the circumstances have changed, the characters have evolved and everybody around me seems to be moving on to their next destination, is no cause to set aside the past. What is it with me and “evolving”?
For a long time I took the book that was my life in New York and shelved it. I don’t know why. There’s no singular reason or a simple explanation… I just did it. I managed to invent all kinds of reasons in my own mind for why, but it was all smoke and mirrors. I might not be the most responsible guy in the world, or the most connected… but I do have a conscience… and I suppose that eased it a bit. Lately though, all of the old nonsense excuses began to unravel and to fade away. You can’t hold fast to a lie (especially one told to yourself) forever. Sooner or later, some good and decent part of you says enough and forces you to take a look at what you’re doing. In my case it took years… but then when you’re waging a self important war of selfloathing against yourself for a decade or two… these things tend to take a back seat. If only such a stupid game of self defeat confined the casualty count to one and that one was me, but sadly, that’s not how things work. Worse still, my need to keep up appearances just makes all of this that much worse, because to the observer I seemed nothing more than a grade A, prick. Wonderful.
So, I’ve put myself on notice. No more avoidance, no more duck and dodge, no more self immolation. It’s time to pull that old book down from the shelf, to blow the dust off of it and to flip through its pages. Lots of good stuff in that old book, lots of great people… it wasn’t “The End”, it was “To be continued”. So much time lost… such stupidity. I thought I was at the bottom of the hill when I was on top… now… now, the real climb starts.
