I’ve been thinking about doing this blog thing for a couple of years now and here we go! Now, how to begin? I am born. No, that’s been done, hasn’t it? Call me Ishmael. That doesn’t really work either. First off, if you call me Ishmael I’m liable not to answer since that isn’t actually my name. Secondly, done already. It was a bright cold day in April…
So, yeah. I’m sitting in my Creative Writing Workshop class the other day. Our fearless leader, Dr. C (not to be confused with the other Dr. C, who may be discussed at a later date) has assigned each class member a chapter from the text to discuss with the class. Notice the key word there: discuss. Notice that the key word contains no actual instructions to actually read the chapter, nearly in its entirety, to the class. We should, most likely, assume that other class members may read the chapters at home. Silently. To themselves.
So, the first guy up and does what? How did you guess? Did I give too much away in my intro paragraph? Yes. He reads. And reads. And reads. When he was done and after I had mostly aroused myself from my coma, and tried, unsuccessfully to rid myself of the ennui, it is the next guy’s turn.
Now, I will cut him some slack because Dr. C did nothing to stop the previous abortion. You see where this is leading? Yeah. Guy #2 starts reading. But there is an important difference. While Guy#1, ESL notwithstanding, read on for probably the length of time it took the Upanishads to be written, he at least read fairly fluently, ESL and all. When Guy#2 starts and struggles and starts again, I am somehow transported through some bizarre space-time continuum and am back in Mrs. Hunt’s class. It’s third grade all over again and Jimmy Hines is reading aloud.
Back then, I often wondered why Mrs. Hunt put us all through it. Why would she insist on this exercise in pain when she had lots of perfectly good readers in the class? Of course, now, as an adult, I know why. But back then? It was rough. I would fidget. My mind would wander. Finally, sneakily and surreptitiously, I would pull my copy of The Outsiders out of my desk and begin to read. It’s like Novocaine–anesthesia for my brain. Jimmy struggles on, but I don’t have to listen. I am in Oklahoma and am some cool Greaser chick–even though I’m only nine and have no idea how one goes about being a cool Greaser chick–and I dream of one day having a boyfriend like Ponyboy or, especially, like Dallas Winston. I guess my predilection for bad boys started kind of early. I was never interested in Darry, Ponyboy’s oldest brother. He was too responsible and level-headed and Darry is a stupid name.
Anyway, the point of the story is that some things never change. It’s 2009 and Jimmy still can’t read. Ralph Macchio dies saving some kid in a fire and then learns karate by painting a fence. Matt Dillon gets gunned down in the street and nobody even remembers C. Thomas Howell.
