There were a few weeks of time where I could not spend any alone time… alone. There was this nagging twitch in my arm that forced me to flip open my cell phone and dial a number, any number. The funny thing is, I never really had much to say. I usually never do, unless I’m in my domain with my domain name, singing my favorite refrain, busting out the name game with my fame. Case-in-point; because I never really have much to say during these abhorrent times of solitude, I start rapping. Sick.
It was not until this past week, that solitude has greeted me more amicably. This moment brought to you by: The Classics. That’s right folks, I’m reading the classics. I picked up To Kill a Mockingbird the other day, and now my brain is having a righteous affair with an old flame. Atticus, oh how I admire your determination and sense of self; never faltering to the traps that peoples’ insecurities set-up for you step after step. Oh Scout, how I have tried, myself, to relinquish a temper that is as natural and forth-right as baking powder and 7-up in a grade-school-made volcano. Oh Jem. That’s all I got. Sorry, Jem. Perhaps there is a 14-year-old in me that I must suppress when it comes to the classics. Every time I hear the word classics, as it relates to books, I automatically disengage. “That’s so boring,” I think to myself.
The classics have proven me wrong before, stealthily sneaking up on my reality-tv-laden mind with a whipped energy that snaps my mind into a different dimension. Oh Upton Sinclair, I can’t thank you enough for The Jungle. Oh Jurgis, could life get any worse for you? Would you ever get a break in this dismal place we call America, specifically 63rd and Halsted? There was a time where I thought my misery would never end on 63rd Street. Driving to Elmhurst and waiting minute after minute to turn left onto Kingery Highway as more and more cars jam themselves into an urban planning disaster, I think of you, Jurgis. Without air conditioning in the summer and in the winter, a heat that would only work on high. I was either freezing, or incredibly warm and always incredibly frustrated in my traffic-jammed life. When my hamburger from McDonalds made me question the tormented meat’s whereabouts, I think of you Jurgis. When I eat that hamburger anyway, I think of the hamburger, Jurgis, cause I’m hungry and I just want to eat the hamburger and my blood sugar is low so stop judging me for what I’m eating cause I need to eat it and I just need some orange juice too. Jurgis. I think of you.
The classics make me believe in my brain again. When other, modern-day novels fail to keep my interest, I am revived with a classic. The old stories bring back older tales that modify an existence not so different from my own. ‘Tis a classic love story, waiting to be told: The Bridge and The Classics.
