I have read 90% of the trilogy before - I stopped somewhere three quarters through the third book about six or seven years ago, and so by now it's better to just read it again starting from the beginning. I have been listening to the audiobook with my 9 year old daughter. Audiobooks are fantastic. They allow me to actually participate in the world of books while getting the every day things done which need to get done. The reader for this book is excellent: a very easy to listen to British accent, which is a must for this series, of course. By now the recording is about 25 years old.
I am pretty sure that the first time I actually read it, I was actually listening to Danny read it aloud to me then, too. He read a lot of books out loud to me when we were first married. It was nice. There is no time for that kind of thing now because of his school work. He has been doing very well with it, but I think the poor man will be so much happier when he can have time to find and pursue his own interests and hobbies again. It has been about two years since he started this program. His hobby before that time was finishing our basement, which he did himself: framed, wired, floored (okay, I helped with that a lot), sheet rocked (we should have done that; we would have done a better job!), and painted. Before that, we lived in Houston and his hobby was his commute. It was 1 hour and 15 minutes there, 1 hour and 15 minutes home. Pretty miserable, if you ask me. That is why we moved.
Danny has it hard now, but I think I would literally wither and die without an outlet for my interests.
Once, when I was feeling particularly miserable because the editing process was so painfully dull, frustrating, and impossible, and I had been editing the first (and so far only) piece of writing which I have ever held in my hands as a book, I mentioned to my friend something like, "I'm never going to write anything ever again." His response made me feel so happy. Something like, "What!? Nooo!!" It feels good that people exist out there who want to read my thoughts and ideas. Even if they didn't, though, I would still have to share them. It's just part of me. I love to write.
Editing, on the other hand, especially co-editing...
Tolkien wrote long. His sentences are beautiful and full of descriptive language, but he's not just telling the story - he is really painting the setting itself in how he tells it. You feel like you are there. It helps a lot that I have in the background of my mind images of the characters, and a gorgeous New Zealand tapestry - but the movies just really don't have the space/ability to do the books justice because it's precisely the slowness, the wordiness, the how-ness, that makes this book so fun. Several times in our 2.5 hour car drive today I found myself just grinning uncontrollably because of some funny nuance in the language (the names of the hobbit families, for example). I had to stop the book to have Jane think about the sentence, “I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.”
That boy who I dated-without-dating called the collective works of J. R. R. Tolkien "literary masturbation" which forever gave me permission to not like them, aka to voice the inner frustration I had always found with them before. I think he did like these books, but they were just too long for him. All the other men in my life who love LOTR are deeply hurt by this colorful phrase. Perhaps it's because this series is the one thing that is not at all tainted by sexuality. Period. Or perhaps because their feelings for the series were deeply tied to feelings of loyalty to their boyhoods. I'm not sure.
It's not like I hadn't tried to read them before. I idolized my brother growing up, and he created an Elvish-esque alphabet and word for his name which he not only wood-burned into a beautiful plaque which he hung above the door of his room - the room in which we spent many long hours talking into the night about European history and fantasy/sci-fi literature - but also wrote onto the sides of all of my future hand-me-down school books along with VASICEK. There wasn't a chance I would grow up without longing to try Tolkien.
It's just that...well...I was always (and still am) a lot better at collecting books than reading them.
I like people.
And also, I guess another reason I never let Tolkien into my childhood was that somehow I got it into my mind to start with the Silmarillion. I should've gone with the Hobbit! Duh. I was an adult by the the time I finally enjoyed it as a book. Not as a movie series. Haha. Dunno, I could only stomach one of them.
I, too, loved (and still love) the outdoors. I didn't (and will not likely ever) have the same kind of relationship that the men in my life have had with nature because, well, unfortunately that wasn't an option. If I could have gone on camp outs, overnight treks, fishing trips, canoeing adventures - I would have. At least I had the great fortune of growing up in a part of the world that is forested. Our house abutted...well, here is a picture.
Was the quarry smaller 20 years ago? This is actually the first I have ever really studied the aerial view of this place. That was not the style or pace of things when I was growing up, to google a place and view it from all angles except perhaps the experiential one, the one which actually matters most.
I knew the paths in those woods very well. I walked there alone quite often, or sometimes with my brother or even rarely, a sister. I liked it best to be alone there, though. There were some canal ruins by the creek, and an old waterfall. There were places where the water was really deep and still and you could see fish. I remember seeing deer and foxes there, too. And people riding dirt bikes. And suddenly you're looking down at the quarry, or you're in the middle of the burned out area (did Myst model the landscape after this place!? I used to wonder).
I think what I loved about the outdoors as a child was the fact that it was a place where I could go and not think, but still think. The only inside place that is remotely similar is music. It's like...you can be thinking your thoughts, but your senses are overwhelmed with noticing other things, like the smell of moss or the sound of birds calling, or the stink of skunkweed which you accidentally stepped on - these things suddenly call your mind away abruptly to faraway places like, "What did the Indians who used to live here think of this?" or "can I walk across the creek on that log without falling in?" or other things like that. When I listen to music, it's like surrendering a piece of my brain to something else, letting it steer. It's like that for the outdoors, too. Both can be so calming.
As an adult, what is calming about being in the countryside in nature is the lack of worry. There's a huge field and the kids can run very far away. You can still see them, but they are free! There isn't a constant nagging fear about cars running them over or strangers talking to them or kidnapping them (!) or etc. It's just wide open skies, trees, fields - so comforting, so much relief.
Growing up is hard. I don't really know from experience what it must have been like to grow up in a male mind or body. It seems stressful in some specific ways that I did not have to deal with (while other things were probably much harder the other way around). Perhaps the strong emphasis on outdoor programming for boys (and not girls) in my church was for good reasons. I can be happy for the men in my life for having such wonderful experiences with scouting. To marry an eagle scout was always my naive wish - fulfilled, too. Though, I am not sure if I can do it without a hint of sadness that can sometimes be masked by regretful, defensive bitterness. I personally do think there were good reasons - along with some painfully stupid ones - for the way scouting worked.
But I am just one person. What can I do against a problem that is bigger than a church culture, especially when it's as big as the entire world's culture? When I am brought up to believe in and strongly value positive discourse but the world teaches that criticism and campaigning is the only valid way to make your voice heard? What can I do when I see, feel, and experience a problem but do not have the tools to name it or even speak about it?
Pray. That's pretty much it.
That is another reason why The Lord of the Rings is such an appealing story: the theme of the small and simple struggling to do what is right, and eventually even succeeding.
Will I ever write something great? Something that is read, shared, beloved, turned into a major motion picture, stained with teardrops on the pages, something so cherished and treasured that the names of my characters become names of generations of children? My forays into fiction have been unsteady. My only semi-successful writing has been in these small bursts (like blog posts) of concerted energy - disconnected ideas and thoughts, and none of it fiction; what compels me to write seems to be the lure of a possible reader. I know that I can write about Czech Genealogy, the Czech Language, my faith, or even just dip the bucket into my inner pool of thoughts and splash it onto the screen. Could I ever hope to aspire to something even greater, though?
Perhaps.
I wonder what would happen if I took my laptop into the outdoors and tried. The fact is, my life is tied up with caring for others, and though that is not a bad thing at all, it does make some logistics tricky. Me + the outdoors is tricky. It's not a casual thing in my life. It's a planned adventure.
But I've learned that there are no easy paths for anyone. None.
The Road goes ever on and onThe best we can hope to find are worthwhile quests and steady friends with whom to share them, and I feel lucky that I have a small handful of those.
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with weary feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
There is only one friend that I have who can truly understand me, though, and for the time being he is not at all as tangible as I would like. Still, I feel a closeness to God when I am paying attention. Perhaps most of all when I am alone (at least in my head) in a beautiful place outdoors.
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