Was writing a while back about frivolity vs. gravity, and how one individual takes a given situation seriously, while the next thinks of it as frivolous. The same is true of snow fall, I suppose. In upstate New York, the beautiful home from whence I hail, 16 inches of snow is quickly pushed to the side of the road, and life moves on without a hitch. The rumor I have been hearing around here, on the other hand, is that there hasn’t been this much snow in Western PA, the new local where I have carved out a home, since 1993. Everything has, consequently, shut down. I had yesterday off of work anyway, but I was called off today, giving me another day cooped up in the new house with Ryan (who slumbers on the opposite couch as I write).
The sun is shining and the snow looks beautiful. I was cracking up a little bit ago as I watched people attempt to excavate their vehicles from the mounds of snow. It called to mind history channel specials of archeological digs, and Annie Dillard’s description of the uncovering of thousands of clay soldiers in China. While I was daydreaming about this, I recalled another thought. A good friend of mine and I have started an informal list of things that make us smile/laugh. Its kind of like inside jokes I guess, but they are all (I think) innocent and universal. For example, when people go to park their cars in those diagonal parking spaces on the side of the street, I just about keel over every time they pull forward and smash their tires into the sidewalk. The car is sliding into its parking space and then the tires hit the curb and the whole vehicle shakes on its shocks. The driver looks back and forth nervously hoping no one has seen (even though I have), and then backs up the car a few inches. It happens all the time outside of the Beaver Starbucks, and it always makes me grin. Sometimes I laugh and chuckle outright just thinking about it. If I start now, I think I could have a full set of encyclopedias dedicated to these sort of events by the time I am old. Then, when I have lost my usefulness to the rest of society, I will just laugh my remaining days away reading about all of the things that have cracked me up since I was 23.
Been keeping busy the last couple days around the house. I want to develop a cultural capacity allowing me contentment in my own home. Having groceries stockpiled would help, there isn’t much to eat around here of late. Ryan walked to a gas station last night for some munch food. Despite the lack of provisions, I’ve been keeping occupied. I’ve been riding my bike a lot lately on my new indoor bike trainer. I throw a DVD in my laptop, some headphones on my ears, and I pedal for a while.
Watched La Vie En Rose, which was beautiful. Had me dreaming on my bike. I’ve concluded that I want to learn up until I die, and I had another thought as well: I want to dream bigger and bigger until I die. The problem with being a dreamer (guilty, I suppose, that’s what people tell me), is that dreams don’t always come true, and to the weak (guilty, too often), this leads to cynicism. How many times can you have your dreams shattered because they didn’t come true? Instead of responding cynically, I want to dream bigger, larger, grander…If my dream fails, then I must not have dreamed it large or elaborate enough.
I want to dream bigger than I can imagine…





Recent Comments