Around noon on Tuesday, having nothing better to do, the inquisitive one drove to the little skating rink in the town square and parked in the garage. After gathering up the hockey skates in the back seat, the inquisitive one walked to the rink.

But the skating rink, the inquisitive one saw, was packed with people! Some were racing one another: a challenging endeavor, considering the short straightaways and tight corners. Some were jumping, spinning, and performing graceful arm movements, also a challenge in the small amount of space available. Some were guiding and teaching small children, who were having trouble keeping their skates upright. And others were skating backwards, with their butts and arms sticking out.

“Why are there so many people on the ice, at this time on a weekday?” the inquisitive one couldn’t help but exclaim. “And how talented they all are. I wonder who they are!”

A nearby woman, who looked to be of retirement age, smiled at the inquisitive one. Then she said, “These are all furloughed federal government employees. They started coming here weeks ago. The government has been shut down for so long that they have gotten quite good at skating! Oh, and come back in a couple hours, if you’d like to see a professional-level hockey game. That’s why I’m here—to get a good seat for that.”

“Wow!” replied the inquisitive one. “Thanks for telling me about this! Perhaps I will join you, in a bit.”

Too intimidated to put on the hockey skates and join the crowd, the inquisitive one strolled into the library. In that great hall, which was usually fairly empty, people were everywhere! And yet a deep silence reigned. Most of the patrons were reading or writing. There were not enough wooden chairs and tables for everyone, but people, it seemed, had brought in their own camping chairs, beanbag chairs, and cushions. There were long lines at the information and checkout desks—especially at the information desk. This line wrapped halfway around the ground floor. Despite this, the people standing in the line did not seem upset; they were all engrossed in physical and e- books. The aisles were as crowded as Walmart on a Sunday afternoon; and yet there were so few books on the shelves that it looked like a post-hurricane looting had occurred.

“Why are there so many people here, at this time on a weekday?” the inquisitive one couldn’t help but whisper. “And they all look so engrossed in their studies. I wonder who they are!”

A nearby man, who looked to be of retirement age, smiled at the inquisitive one. Then he whispered, “These are all furloughed federal government employees. They started coming here weeks ago. The government has been shut down for so long that they have learned quite a lot! Would you like to attend a lecture by one of them, on Ancient Rome? That’s why I’m here. It starts in a couple hours, but we will want to reserve our seats, as there is sure to be a standing-room-only crowd. The lecturer has become one of the world’s foremost experts in that era.”

“Wow!” replied the inquisitive one. “Thanks for telling me about this! Perhaps I will join you, in a bit.”

There being so few books on the shelves, there was little point in the inquisitive one hanging around to browse. Turning and walking toward the door, the inquisitive one glanced at the message boards on the wall. These were plastered over with beautifully designed placards announcing other events happening that day: and it seemed that every conceivable type of artistic and scholarly and athletic endeavor was represented. And then, glancing out of the big, front-facing windows, which were suddenly rumbling, the inquisitive one saw a fleet of helicopters. And the inquisitive one wondered whether the president was aboard one of them.

Then instantly, in a fit of passion, the inquisitive one ran out into the chilly air and shouted something up at the helicopters, at top volume.

But what exactly the inquisitive one said must remain a mystery, because, at that moment, a band burst into the opening strains of a loud, soul-thumping, perfectly in-tune, hauntingly sweet, and beautifully patriotic song.

On New Year’s Day, the inquisitive one sat down with a brand new pad of paper and brand new pen, both received as gifts the previous month.

The inquisitive one thought very seriously for a few minutes, biting softly on a thumb. Then suddenly, the inquisitive one removed the thumb from the mouth, picked up the pen, and wrote a string of words on the pad, reciting them aloud while writing:

“This year, I resolve to GROW more VEGETABLES, RUN more MILES, READ more BOOKS, and COOK more HEALTHY MEALS than I EVER have in ANY YEAR before!”

The inquisitive one underlined the key words several times and then drew little illustrations of veggies, running shoes, books, and cooking utensils all around the sentence on the pad. Happily, the inquisitive one tore the top sheet off the pad and taped it to the fridge.

But a week or so later—alas!—things were not going well as regards the resolution. You see, the inquisitive one had had some pretty impressive years in the past, in the realms of vegetable growing, mile running, book reading, and healthy meal cooking. This year so far, the inquisitive one had been sadly neglecting those activities, in favor of relative entertaining, light bulb replacing, nose blowing, highway driving, obscure fact Googling, schmancy gala attending, and frantic HVAC guy calling.

To make up for lost time, the inquisitive one tossed some dry beans, frozen kale, and stock in a crock pot, drove to the gym, got on a treadmill, and attempted to run while alternating between reading a novel and browsing a seed catalogue.

By the end of that day, the inquisitive one had decided to grow tomatoes, variety TBD; run half a mile; read half a page; and cooked a healthy meal that tasted like pebbles in a polluted stream.

Angrily, the inquisitive one snatched the resolution off the fridge, crumpled it up, and threw it away. The inquisitive one got out the special pad and pen and wrote a sentence on the topmost sheet, reciting the words while writing:

“This year, I resolve to make NO New Year’s resolution!!”

The inquisitive one, having neglected to draw anything around the sentence, proudly ripped off the sheet and taped it to the fridge.

The next day, however, the revised resolution did not sit well with the inquisitive one. Every time the inquisitive one went to get some string cheese, hummus, broccoli, butter, or whatever, the sentence seemed to stare outwards with menace.

After a couple of days of repeated, unsettling intimations from the fridge door, the inquisitive one tore down the paper, crumpled it up, and threw it away.

Once again, the inquisitive one got out the deliciously beautiful, and amazingly functional, pad and pen. Once again, the inquisitive one chewed softly on a thumb. And once again, suddenly the inquisitive one wrote and recited a sentence:

“This year, I resolve to make a New Year’s resolution.”

The inquisitive one decorated the page with illustrations of flowers, birds, clouds, and special pads and pens; boogie danced on over to the fridge; and taped it up.

The next day, the inquisitive one spent a lot of time working on a project for the boss, shopping for clothes, and talking on the phone.

The day after that, the inquisitive one went on a long run, finished reading the novel, and baked a big batch of granola.

And the day after that, the inquisitive one, with great excitement, decided to plant a variety of sweet pepper that was, according to the seed catalogue, “very productive,” “early maturing,” and “displease resistant.”

I know, I know—we were in the middle of a series of posts about Émile Zola’s The Ladies’ Paradise, but I’d like to hit pause on that to share some exciting news with you all: I have acquired my first byline! So, apologies, but you will have to live in suspense as regards the nineteenth-century novel I was previewing—it’s a lot to ask, but I’m confident that you will find the strength to abide the delay—as I tell you about something really cool called Silent Book Club.

Unlike traditional book clubs, Silent Book Club has no assigned reading. You don’t have to read what other people are reading—although you can, if you want to. Like traditional book clubs, Silent Book Club brings book lovers together to talk about books and interesting ideas, make new friends, and hang out with old friends.

What do people do at a Silent Book Club meeting? Well, first, we bring whatever book we’re reading to the venue, and we order a drink; meetings are often held at places like bars, wine bars, breweries, and the like (though, of course, there’s no obligation to drink alcohol, and people order what they please). Then, we alternate between chatting informally about books and anything else we feel like yammering about, and reading in friendly silence.

I first heard of Silent Book Club through an article in Poets & Writers magazine. Upon learning that the nearest club was farther from my home than I wanted to travel, I started my own local club. This was one of the best decisions I have ever made. I discovered that Silent Book Club is a great way to meet interesting, smart, and fun people. It’s also a great way to get some reading done.

I have been hosting Silent Book Club meetings for two years now, and our club has recently expanded from offering meetings every other week to offering meetings most weeks, at two different times and days so more people can participate. We also recently took a “field trip” to a bookstore / wine bar in a nearby town, which was great fun.

But back to my exciting news—I was invited to write a blog post for the Silent Book Club website, and it is now live! I invite you to read my article New Year’s Book Solutions, which is about tips for making time for reading. If you’ve ever struggled to find the time to read, or if you, like me, have made a New Year’s resolution to read books, you may find something useful in there. Click here to read the article!

I want to thank you all for reading my writing—it means a lot to me. I hope it helps you in some way. Our regularly scheduled programming will resume on Wednesday. Until then, stay safe, stay warm, and keep on reading, folks.

Another year’s end has snuck up on us: Happy New Year’s Eve! Let’s take a moment to reflect on the past and look ahead to the future. Let’s do it for old times’ sake! We do it every year; why break a good tradition now? . . . especially since it’s such a wise and valuable tradition.

New Year’s Resolutions

Have you made any resolutions for the upcoming year? If so, I’d love to hear what they are—tell me about them in the comments!

As for me, I’m pretty boring—that is, consistent and persistent and other positive adjectives like those—because I make the same resolution every year. My New Year’s resolution for 2019, as for every year, is to read 50 books. I only rarely achieve this goal, to tell the truth, but it’s good, I feel, to have high aspirations.

This year I read a total of 37 books. Gulp—that’s not nearly as close to 50 as I would have liked. However, I did, this year, read the 1079-page masterwork Infinite Jest, by David Foster Wallace, from start to finish. That must count for at least 10 or 20 books . . . right?

In any case, I am finding it more and more important, in the digital age, to stake out reading time for myself. Early in the morning and before bed seem to be the best reading times for me. I love, love, love reading—but, still, my phone calls to me softly. Softly, incessantly, it beckons; I have to resist, and to actively decide to read: as opposed to tap and scroll around aimlessly. Does anyone else struggle with this? Any tips?

More Opposites That Are the Same

While writing my post Shopping Cart Wisdom, I was delighted to stumble across another set of opposite words with the same meaning! (See my recent post These Two? Exactly the Same.)

Writing about the categorical imperative, a philosophy developed by Kant, made me wonder about the word categorical. Shouldn’t that, I thought, be uncategorical? The answer is no. Confusingly, the word categorical means “unconditional” or “unqualified.” We modern folk, however, often add -un and say uncategorical when we mean categorical. Technically, these two words are opposites; but in everyday usage, they have, mistakenly, come to have the same meaning. Check out the embarrassing malapropism in this video between 0:30 and 0:40 . . . oops.

This prefix confusion made me think of another duo of opposites! Inflammable means “capable of being set on fire; combustible.” It’s a relative of the word inflame. However, as this word is very important for safety reasons, people started using the word flammable to mean the same thing, fearing that people might mistakenly think that the prefix in- means “not.” And so we have two words that seem as if they could be opposites, but have the same meaning. (See dictionary.com’s Usage note for more info!)

What Is a Blog?

While we’re on the subject of word usage, let’s talk about the word blog. Its etymology is “web” + “log” = weblog, or blog for short. A blog is a log—that is, a diary or journal—that’s on the web. Nobody uses weblog anymore (did anyone ever?), but it’s a good mnemonic device: a blog is a web log containing many entries. Each individual entry is called a post. Admittedly, some dictionaries have a secondary definition indicating that one post can be referred to as a blog; but other dictionaries do not. I’d like to stand by my assertion that a blog is the entire collection, not just one item in the collection.

Auld Lang Syne

I’ll refrain from analyzing the etymology of auld lang syne, as doing so may try the patience of all of us! Besides, we have things to do, places to go, people to meet, and flammable and inflammable objects to ignite . . . or at least watch being ignited. Have a fabulous last day of 2018 and first day of 2019!

The author and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston could not find a publisher for her book Barracoon that did not want her to make extensive changes to the manuscript (as I mentioned in my last blog post), and so her book was not released until 50+ years after her death, 80+ years after it was written.

The cause of the disagreement between Hurston and the publisher was that Hurston had written the story of Cudjo/Kossula in dialect. That is, she had transcribed his words as he spoke them (as an anthropologist concerned with preserving the speaker’s voice), instead of “translating” his words to “proper” English (as an author concerned with reaching a wide audience). The former style is more accurate; the latter style is easier to read.

I remember reading Huckleberry Finn for the first time—as a former high school English teacher, I have read it many times—and experiencing confusion and frustration when encountering Mark Twain’s rendering of the character Jim’s speech. I must have been halfway through the book before it finally dawned on me that chile meant “child” pronounced without the “d” sound. I kept reading it as “chili” (meat and beans in a bowl) or “chili” (a hot pepper) or “Chile” (the country) . . . none of which, needless to say, made any sense.

When I read Barracoon, I had no trouble with Hurston’s rendering of Cudjo/Kossula’s speech. I very much enjoyed reading the story in dialect, and I concur with her instincts to tell his story that way.* Then again, I am an experienced reader with two degrees in English. I wonder how well I would have been able to follow the story had I read it in my teens, or not pursued English degrees.

I am curious what you think about the following passage. Here Cudjo/Kossula describes his life as a 19-year-old, just before his town was raided and he was captured:

“I stand round de place where de chief talk wid de wise men. I hope dey see Cudjo and think he a grown man. Maybe dey call me to de council. De fathers doan never call me but I likee very much to be dere and lissen when dey talk. . . . I likee go in de market place too and see de pretty gals wid de gold bracelets on de arm from de hand to de elbow. Oh, dey look very fine to Cudjo when dey walkee dey sling de arm so and de bracelet ring. I lak hear dat—it sound so pretty.”

How easy or difficult did you think that passage was to read? What do you think about books that make extensive use of dialect?

*In full disclosure, I made a similar decision when writing my unpublished novel The Water-Creatures . . . and may well face the same consequences as Hurston . . . if not worse.