The Rider – Part 6

The next afternoon my brother called our parents from the Marine recruiter’s office. He was not emotional in the least; it was only a call to let them know that they were having some paperwork issues and he would be late for dinner. The printer in the recruiter’s office had been acting up and they were in the process of repairing it.

On my brother’s end of the line, it was a very unemotional phone call. On my mother’s end, however, it was anything but. As my mother hung up the phone, she was visibly shaken. My sister asked who it was, to which my mother replied quietly that it was our brother and he was signing up for the Marines. She looked at me especially long, more THROUGH me than AT me, and I knew that she held me accountable for his decision. My father, who had been in the garage tinkering around with one of his latest projects, had stepped into the house from the garage as soon as the phone had begun to ring.

It was sad to see her mood drop in a matter of a sixty second phone call. My mother, who was crafting her (as she called it) “world famous” chicken enchiladas, had been humming happily to herself in the kitchen as she darted from drawer to drawer, cupboard to cupboard, gathering her ingredients. After the phone was hung up and she had looked at me and then the floor for what seemed like an eternity. She released a short sigh, then resumed her cooking.

My brother and I hadn’t told anyone else in the family about our incident the night before but, with the exception of my sister who had been at school before we had awakened that morning, our family had felt the tension between us. My brother and I had avoided each other all day long. Usually we both slept in too late, a fact that our father always made a point to mention over breakfast and any discussions on productivity. This particular day, however, he’d gotten out of bed before me. As I laid in my bed, I had heard my mother’s gasp and knew that she had seen his face. I didn’t want to see what that side of his face looked like hours after the fact. I knew that it was serious; the swelling in my knuckles was pretty serious as well. Trying to move my hand left me wincing in pain.

My mother had always been very protective of us and she wasn’t quite ready for us to grow up yet. We’d had a good childhood, most of that fact attributed to her deep love for all of us children. Although my brother and I had disagreed on many things over the years but we both knew that we were loved deeply by our parents.

I don’t know if my parents ever truly forgave me for the split. My father was a veteran himself but he wasn’t that excited to deal with my mother after getting the phone call that day. He, himself, had served in the Navy but claimed to have not been involved in anything “substantial”. With the way he would pause before uttering the word, I had always been curious if he HAD been involved in something substantial.

Dear Ash, It’s Your Mother

Dearest Ashley,

I’m penning this note to address a couple of items that your father and I have been discussing the past couple of days in preparation for this weekend’s family reunion.

I can’t stress it enough that we are quite disappointed about the decision that you and Cheryl have made. Deciding to spend your weekend at the cabin that Scotty rented in Tennessee instead of accompanying your father and I is, quite frankly, selfish and immature.

You know as well as I do how little your father enjoys these annual gatherings. If you were to tag along, as you’ve done every year in the past, you could assist me in keeping your father’s mood swings to a minimum. If I’m not mistaken, you haven’t forgotten how much of a boor he was last year after stumbling into the liquor cabinet. I doubt that Aunt Bethel will even attend this year’s festivities, considering how rude and obnoxious your father was to her last year. I will do my best this year to keep an eye on him, but I could definitely use you and Cheryl as a couple extra pairs of watchful eyes. Besides, you’ve always been a fan of your cousin Lucy’s macaroni salad. I swear that I’ve tried, unsuccessfully, to craft that same dish but you know that with our hard water, the noodles never seem to turn out as soft as hers. I hate to get off topic, but I want you to know how much you will be missing out on this year.

We are glad you’re getting some good mileage out of the Oldsmobile, but you know how neurotic your father can be when it comes to maintenance of the vehicles. He wanted me to be sure and mention that the oil change is past due and he thinks it may be a good idea to leave it parked at the house until the service can be performed on it. Knowing how bad you are at remembering to contact the shop, he’s already called and scheduled you a full tune-up before the trip. If for whatever reason the mechanic can’t get to it, your father prefers that you use Cheryl’s car instead of the Classic on a longer road trip. There’s no guarantee that your father’s friend Freddy can get the Oldsmobile in the shop on such short notice and to soothe your father’s mind, please do as I ask.

Ashley, your father is not thrilled in the least about how much time you have been spending with Scotty. We’ve discussed him before and you know we don’t approve of him. He’s crass, disrespectful and downright dangerous to have as a friend. His curiousity will most likely get you into some trouble, mark my words. Why don’t you spend more time with that nice Olsen boy? What’s his name, Sean? He seems to have a good head on his shoulders and he is respectful to his mother, unlike Scotty. On a sidenote, so you know, your father can tell when you’ve let Scotty drive the car. You’ve been told before that if you choose to take the Classic out, you don’t need to be sharing the wheel with anyone else, least of all Scotty.

I wanted to mention this girl you’re dating now, as well. Your father and I feel that you are doing yourself a disservice by continuing to run around with Linda. She doesn’t seem like a horrible person per se, but she seems to be a bit too much of a dreamer. ESP? Really? You know that sort of talk makes your father and I quite uncomfortable. There is nothing natural about thinking you can read minds or predict card tricks. Coming from the family that Linda comes from, it only seems natural that she would be an underperformer. Ashley, my son, it feels like she has a bit of a distracting influence on you. If you would only focus, you could have made it onto the management team at S-Mart by now. There is no real future in housewares, and we wish you’d figure out what to do with your life. Get your life in order, son. Move either up in housewares or out of S-Mart. You are young enough and have enough life left in front of you that your options are endless. Linda doesn’t appear to have any sort of future goals, at least judging by our previous conversations with her. I know that you claim to be in love with her, but please listen to your mother. I can tell she’s holding you back.

I’m deeply sorry about the negative tone of this letter, and do want to remind you how much your father and I love you.

I dearly hope this letter makes it to your dorm room before you leave for the weekend. It would please your father and I immensely if you and Cheryl would reconsider your plans. Spending the weekend in the woods of Tennessee in a rickety, old log cabin sounds awfully dangerous, son.

Pass along our love to Cheryl,
Your mother.

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This “letter” was a result of having read a writer’s exercise last week where the task was to write a letter to a fictional character, in the interests of sparking some inspiration. I’m toying with the idea of taking some of my favorite characters and making a few more of these humorous “letters” from the point of the mother in the future.

Getting the milk for free?

I have been writing for just about as long as I can remember. There are millions of words out there that I’ve laid down, some public and some not. As I come into my late 30s I realized that I have never made a dime off the stuff that is bouncing around inside of my head. My wife has asked me over the last couple of years, jokingly, when I am going to publish a novel so we can retire and live off royalties. On the one hand, I am a bit of a dreamer, but on the other I am a realist. I am aware that the writing market is saturated with people who think that others want to hear what they think, maybe even NEED to hear what they think, and they’re willing to charge a fee for those thoughts

I wrote a silly little zombie tale a few years back called “The IT Guy” (almost entirely on my T-Mobile Sidekick to boot!) and it took off like wildfire on several websites. Now granted, I was basically “preaching to the choir” when I posted it in the Fan Fiction section of a couple zombie fan sites, but if people are so willing to read my stuff for free would they be willing to throw a couple bucks my way to read something from a more polished and experienced author? Would they be willing to hear my ideas in a completely different genre?

Lately I have really been thinking about getting a bit more serious about this writing thing. We’re in a world where EVERYONE is online now at any given time of day, EVERYONE is reading on their electronic devices, and EVERYONE is connected in ways we never thought possible. I have bought into this as well, and have blazed through some book reading with both my Nook and my Android phone.

I have “liked” some Facebook interests about writing and have gotten on some mailing lists for aspiring authors. I attended, last month, a meeting of other writers who wanted to sit together and write creatively. I have made an effort recently to immerse myself in the world of writing. I absolutely LOVE reading other peoples’ words formed into sentences and I hope to give readers the same pleasure while reading MY words that I get from other writers.

I was talking to a friend at church last week (hey John!) who had asked for the link to my blog so he could dig around through some of the stuff I have written previously. I told him that I would love to be able to write more often and that my wife had been ribbing me about my first book. He told me that he thought I really could make a little something out of my writing and he’s not the first person who’s mentioned it. I don’t take compliments very well, but I’m wondering if these folks are right. If they are right, why SHOULDN’T I get a piece of the pie?

I have read several articles in the last month or so about self-publishing. I have an online friend who has a novel already out there published and he’s working on a second. He’s read through some of the stuff I have written and has provided some excellent feedback that I am truly appreciative of.

Amazon seems to offer a pretty sweet setup for writers who would like to get some of their writing disseminated to the masses. I’m curious, dear reader, if you would be willing to shell out anywhere from two to five dollars for an e-book version of my stories. I’m contemplating leaving the first five chapters of my latest story, “The Rider” up on my blog here for free, as a preview if you will, and then collating the remainder of the story into an e-book I would put up for sale on Amazon to start with. I have an idea where I’m taking the story, or at least how I plan on ending it, but the fun part for you and I is the journey to the last sentence of the story.

I love writing, and I plan on continuing to write my usual little blurbs on the blog here but I’m throwing down the gauntlet to myself and seeing if I can parlay this little odd hobby of mine into something that could truly matter.

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The Rider – Part 5

I asked him if we had met before and I was somehow unaware of it. His reply was just as cryptic as everything else he’d said up to this point. “In a manner of speaking, yes. We’ve met before. It’s difficult to explain fully, but all things will work themselves out in time”.

I was quickly beginning to regret picking up this man. Initially I had wanted some company to keep me awake, but the way our conversation was headed was beginning to make me a bit uncomfortable. I was hoping for some generic small talk just to keep me awake and I figured that there was no harm in giving an old man a ride to where he needed to go as well. This man didn’t come across as though he wanted to cause me pain, only that he had something in mind for me and hadn’t felt the need to share it with me fully yet.

I pressed my right foot down, ever so slightly, and felt the steady increase of the engine’s speed as we accelerated. After the latest statement from him, I wasn’t feeling especially talkative and I focused on the dashed lines in the left corner of my peripheral vision as they passed more and more rapidly.

Minutes passed by and I’m assuming he could sense my unease. The car was silent. The only sounds were our breathing and the soft hum of the engine. Finally, after what felt like hours almost, he broke the silence with three words.

“Are you happy?”

I wasn’t quite sure how I should respond to this because I hadn’t been asked that particular question before. I was not an “open book”, I had no interest in sharing my feelings with people, especially a stranger that I had just picked up on the side of the road. I pretended to not hear him and stared straight ahead. I clenched my jaw until it began to ache. I gripped the steering wheel with both hands with so much force that my knuckles felt like they were cracking. I put all my effort into staring down the road ahead. As I made every effort to ignore him, I looked at the trees only partly illuminated by my high beams on either side of the road and then he asked again.

“Are you happy?”

I couldn’t ignore him the second time around. I turned my head only partly in his direction, refusing to look into his face. I could feel his eyes boring into me and awaiting an answer. I mumbled a response to him and he calmly told me that he couldn’t hear me.

I repeated myself but with more than just a single word.

“No, I suppose I’m not but why is that any of your business?”

“I’m only curious, friend. There was a time in my life that I was unhappy as well. One of my goals during our time together is to help you with this sadness you’re feeling.”

“During our time together? Sir, I plan on dropping you off where you need to go, and continuing on to my original destination. I don’t know how long you planned on us being together.”

“That’s the thing though. I didn’t tell you where I needed to go. I know where YOU are going and I know that you need some conversational accompaniment for this trip. I’m going where you’re going.”

***************************
See more of “THE RIDER” HERE.

The Rider – Part 4

My brother and I both knew what the Vietnam War had done to people, courtesy of the research papers we had completed earlier in the school year. My brother sympathized with the young men who had served; he could see how the things they’d seen and done would ruin their innocence and leave them broken. Me, I saw a set of young men different from the altruistic, self-sacrificing idealistics my brother saw. I saw the bloodlust and the joy they seemed to take in the carnage. We had engaged in countless discussions on the subject, and still weren’t ready to accept the fact that neither of us would budge an iota on our opinions. Regardless of how we felt about the other’s opinion, we had always ended with a few laughs and an “agree-to-disagree” mentality.

I threw the first punch but was stopped by my brother, who had jumped between the old man and I. The way he’d angled himself in front of the older man had created an awkward angle for my arm and I had too much momentum behind my fist to stop. I ended up hitting him with enough force that I broke two knuckles and immediately left a rapidly-growing welt on my brother’s left cheek. As my brother fell to the ground, the man stumbled away, continuing to mutter. I tried to help my brother up, but he jerked away from my advance and swore under his breath. I had no words to express my regret, but I continued to apologize to him. I’d been in plenty of fights up to this point, as had my brother, but never had we faced off against one another.

My brother was an impressive fighter. Thin as a whip, but wiry as they come, the strength in his body was very misleading. For the most part, he would go out of his way to befriend someone, especially if he knew that there was any level of animosity in them. He abhorred unnecessary violence and it was obvious. Although my brother made every effort to pacify anyone who would think of starting a fight, he had gotten into a few scraps that he couldn’t get out of. I had seen one of them and, ever the gentleman, my brother had immediately helped up his opponent after laying him flat on his back with a single punch.

Even though the punch I had just thrown wasn’t intended for my brother, as soon as my fist had connected with his cheek, I knew our relationship had come to a crossroads. Things wouldn’t be the same and I was definitely worse off because of it.

See more of “THE RIDER” HERE.

The Rider – Part 3

“Sure. Where are you looking to go?”

“East. I’m pretty sure I know where you’re headed and trust me, you could use some company.”

Considering that I was the one driving the car and I had never seen this man before, it seemed like a rather odd response. Before I could say anything else, he had opened the door and shifted his weight onto the passenger seat. He only had a single backpack on him and he threw it over the seat, narrowly missing my nose and landing with a thud in the back of the car.

Immediately the car was filled with the smell of a man who’d been outdoors for a good, long while. It wasn’t necessarily a horrible smell, but it was the smell of a working man who hadn’t had a chance yet to wash off the stench of a long day of labor.

I lifted my foot off the brake and turned to look at him. As the sun made its way across the car, the light was getting brighter and I could see his face a little clearer. Wrinkled lines ran down the length of his face, making him appear older than he may have actually been. His hands, sitting across his lap, looked worn as well. Calluses on the outside of his knuckles had gotten to the point that they almost looked like blisters. It was obvious that he was not an office worker. This man worked with his hands and he worked hard.

I must have been staring for an awkwardly lengthy amount of time, because it took him clearing his throat before I looked away. There was just enough time for me to catch a shimmer in his eye that I’d seen before.

“So, what are you doing out here, anyway?” I asked.

With a long, audible swallow, he answered that he’d been traveling a long time and I had come along at the perfect time for him. He had been waiting on that stretch of road for a good amount of time. He knew that I would be the one to pick him up and we had a lot to talk about.

See more of “THE RIDER” HERE.

Haven’t forgotten.

I’m still thinking of you, buddy. Here it is six months later and you’re in my thoughts daily. Hope all is well up there.

A Mission Statement

One of the oddest things about writing is how often random ideas for writing will pop into my head. In this day and age, our electronic doo-dads can be both a blessing AND a curse. Yes, they are incredibly distracting and have left us with little to no social interaction skills, but on the other hand, sites/applications like Evernote and Springpad make it simple to get a thought down almost instantaneously, even with no pen or paper handy. Have your smartphone or tablet handy? Sweet, you can get down your idea and it will sync almost immediately!

Speaking of random thoughts, a good example of this would happen to be a movie from 1996 that just popped into my thoughts earlier today as I was thinking of a new post to write.

Jerry Maguire

Do you remember, in the first few minutes of the film, the mission statement Jerry writes in his hotel room and then throws into his coworkers’ mailboxes? He was ridiculed (even let go from his job) for writing his honest middle-of-the-night thoughts but his moral awakening ended up becoming the entire centerpoint of the movie. Besides Jerry Maguire being one of Cameron Crowe’s better ones (I love his stuff, but couldn’t make it through Elizabethtown), it got me thinking. Why can’t I, as a self-proclaimed writer, write more of these mission statement-type things? I’ve been making a point to branch out into other types of writing but I’m still a work in progress.

With the exception of my wife, I didn’t get much feedback on my first poem written in quite some time, The Tree, but it may be due to the fact that there never really was much of an explanation to it. I’m still trying to figure out my writing skill set. Sometimes, I’ll get such a grand writing idea and then have no real way to put it into words without it sounding just awkward and clunky. “The Tree” is a great example of that. While on a hike at work a few months back, I came across the scene described in the poem. The gravitas that I was standing in a place where something horrible had happened was not lost on me. I finished my hike that day and mentally ran over and over different scenarios of how I could get that girl’s story out. I mentioned to my wife that maybe I could write the scene from the girl’s point of view, but was having a tough time trying to get into that mindset. At my current writing level, it just seems (and I may be selling myself short here, but there is NO WAY I would want to portray such an awful act in a trivial manner) that there is no way I could write this in her voice without completely mucking it up. I can’t even  fathom how terrifying a violation of that magnitude would be. There is no way, as a man, that I would do this girl’s story justice. My wife agreed and I ended up with a poem. Is it formulaic? Yes, it most certainly is. It rhymes at the end of every line, I’m aware. I knew, however, that I wanted to get SOMETHING out there for whoever she is (or was, God forbid).

Going back to Jerry Maguire, what sort of subjects make people squirm in their seats? Which subject draws them in and keeps them engrossed in what they read? Why are we not writing more about THOSE things? Any story worth its weight in salt has left your emotions in a different place then where they started, hasn’t it? Did you finish that last page the same person you were when you read the first page? I’ll never forget the first time I read “The Exorcist” by William Peter Blatty. Yes, I’d seen the movie already, but that book left me SLEEPLESS for nights on end. Same with Stephen King’s “It”. I don’t necessarily have a lifelong fear of clowns or anything, but I did lose sleep reading that book. How about NON-horror books that have left me reeling? Elie Wiesel’s “Night” is an unbelievable book. It’s thin but don’t let that fool you; it packs an emotional punch that you won’t recover from any time soon. Tolstoy’s “Confession”? Phillip Gourevitch’s book on the Hutu/Tutsi bloodshed in Rwanda in 1994?

After spending a good majority of my life up to this point reading (all sorts of genres) and writing (mostly horror because it seemed to come easier to me), I let those two things slip away over the last few years. I’ve been caught up in all sorts of other time-sucks and lost my way as a reader and writer. Spending the last couple of years making an honest effort at involving myself on both sides of the creative spectrum, I’ve been bouncing back and forth between writing my own things and reading as much as possible (thank you Mantano Reader for being so awesome and accessible on both my phone AND rooted Nook).

I honestly wish I had more time to write. I really wish I could just sit for hours and write on any and every subject. Some subjects would fall flat, obviously, but others could really take off if I put some time and thought into them. I have no words to describe how writing makes me feel. If I had to attempt, I would say it calms me down. Regardless of the subject being authored, the act of writing makes me feel that I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing. Even if I can only get a few words written each day, I’ll keep plugging along here.

The full misssion statement (as written by Cameron Crowe)

Pima Writer’s Forum – Tucson

So earlier this month I signed up for a membership on MeetUp.com to see about maybe connecting with other writers in the area. Tonight was the first meeting I attended and I really enjoyed the hour I spent with these folks. We turned a twenty-minute writing exercise into about forty-five minutes of writing and ended up banging out some pretty good stuff. I had to leave early so unsure how much everybody else got done, but I rambled on about two different subjects (which I’ll “transpose” below from my handwritten stuff).

Don’t be mad that there’s no real conclusion to either; they were just an exercise in getting the creative juices flowing. I may come back to the ideas later on and flesh them out a bit more, but for now they are what they are.

RAMBLE #1 (Frontside of page)

I turned to look again at the stranger and it was eerie how familiar he seemed to me. As our eyes met, I had a creepy feeling that I either knew him or had seen him somewhere previously. To call the feeling “deja vu” wasn’t quite accurate; there WAS some degree of familiarity between us, but the space and time didn’t figure into things. It was only his eyes that stood out to me. His face was like the countless others in the crowd. But those eyes were not.

When I was a younger man, I was constantly receiving compliments on my own eyes. I was, myself, a huge fan of eyes. Some men are drawn to various other physical attributes, but I wasn’t “some men”. Eyes, to me, revealed so much about a person. Mad eyes, bedroom eyes, sleep eyes. There was always a backstory to a person’s eyes. Whether it occurred five minutes prior, or ten years, there was some event that influenced the eyes that looked back at you.

I was completely unsure how to read his eyes. He didn’t appear mad or incredibly happy. They sparkled, but from what cause was uncertain. As I continued to stare, I could tell he was becoming uncomfortable. He took a step in my direction and my stare was broken almost immediately. He opened his mouth and asked if we knew each other. I mumbled that I wasn’t sure but his eyes looked familiar. Now that I had said what might be the strangest words I’ve ever uttered, it was out there. He smiled and said that wasn’t the first time he’d been complimented on his eyes. I began to tell him it was more of a matter-of-fact statement than it was a compliment, but held back. This encounter was awkward enough already and if he wanted to consider it a compliment, so be it.

RAMBLE #2 (Backside of page)

It was incredibly hot and I’d gotten tired of walking. I had thought that a trip out from camp to gather firewood would be over and done with by now but here it was, an hour later, and I was lost in the woods with no firewood to show for it. Along the walk, I had suffered a couple injuries. My right hand was bleeding as a result of being snagged on a thorn and my left knee had become swollen after a misstep during my first fifteen minutes of this walk. My mood, which had previously been pretty jovial, was now sullen and I was muttering to myself.

Back at the camp, my friends were setting up for dinner. Joe and I had taken firewood duty. He had gone one direction and I had gone the other. My attitude was worsened by the fact that Joe had been flirting constantly with Candace. Joe knew that Candace was the main drawing point for me even coming out to this barren forest. Why on earth was he taking the lead with her? Maybe I needed to be more assertive. My father had told me that for years. He was my polar opposite. A quiet man who timidly hoped for events to transpire, my father was a boisterous man who usually wore out his welcome within minutes of meeting someone.

Here I was, out of water and short on patience, wandering through the woods. Usually I had no problem with the outdoors, but it was going to be dark very soon. Darkness, as a general rule, didn’t bother me either, but being annoyed and hungry will always aggravate one’s usual fears and opinions.

Lost in my thoughts, I didn’t initially hear the leaves behind me crackling. It wasn’t until I heard a grunt that I turned around. To see nothing there. Wow, I was getting tired and annoyed. I wasn’t quite sure which direction would return me to camp but I looked around, trying to retrace my steps this far. My knee was throbbing steadily, but I was pretty sure it would hold up.

Books…To A Good Home

One of my favorite places to spend time in is a used bookstore. Don’t get me wrong; I don’t have any real beef with a Barnes and Noble, but there is a sort of magic that exists on the shelves of a used bookstore. When we lived in Florida, we made regular pilgrimages to Chamblin Bookmine, which is still, up to this point, THE pinnacle of a used book store. If you ever happen to be in Jacksonville, drop by this place. I would highly recommend leaving your schedule open for the remainder of your day, however, as you will never be so happy to get lost in a store.

On our way to see “The Hobbit” this past Sunday afternoon, we swung by Bookman’s here in Tucson because I wanted to check the Cormac McCarthy section and see if, by some miraculous turn of good luck, they had a used copy of “Child of God” available. Alas, it was not to be. The “McCarthy” shelf only contained multiple copies of “The Road” along with the entire Border trilogy in all shapes and sizes. I own these already and have read “The Road” three times now. Something that DID jump out, however, was one particular copy of “All The Pretty Horses”.

What caught my eye was a hardback with some obvious wrinkling in the spine and the dust cover missing. This particular book was placed in such a way that it almost appeared as a bookend for this particular shelf. I reached up to take it from the shelf and the first page I opened to had a paragraph highlighted. I flipped a couple pages forward and came across handwritten notes. I love handwritten notes inside used books. They are there for a specific reason. Some that I’ve seen were easier than others to understand, but I love seeing them regardless. This book had been READ. There were so many notes and highlights that it was difficult to flip more than two or three pages without finding another set of writings that were not placed there by Mr McCarthy himself.

I mentioned to my wife that it’d be cool to buy the book just for the scrawled thoughts of its previous owner and she egged me on with a “Well get it then!“ but it didn’t feel like I would get as much from it. I love the book already. Why not let someone who has never read “All The Pretty Horses” see those notes and take something from the book they may not have otherwise been privy to. Although an author has a point they’re attempting to convey with their writing, sometimes the meat and potatoes of the tale is found in the discussion OUTSIDE of it.

Leaving the McCarthy shelf a tad bit dejected (I really want to read Child of God before James Franco gets it up on the bigscreen), I headed over to another favorite author’s section; Mr Nick Hornby. Hornby has written several books I’ve enjoyed, but none more so than “High Fidelity”. I haven’t read him in quite awhile, even though I’m aware he has released a couple new books. I arrived to his shelf and the first book I saw was “Slam”. Now before talking about what exactly I found in “Slam”, I must take you on a journey to another tangent.

I’ve never been a guy who sticks to the conventional bookmark. I will use any slip of paper that happens to be nearby me when finding a good stopping point. That being said, I have used my airline boarding pass multiple times before. In the past, I’ve used the receipt for the book I purchased, a torn piece of toilet paper, a wrapper from the candy bar I snagged from the vending machine, whatever is near me is fair game. Seriously. So it’s funny, to me anyway, when I see someone else who does the same thing. I was looking through the used book section of Hastings a couple years back and came across a paperback copy of “Up In The Air” that had an airline ticket in it. Perhaps it’s just my own quirkiness, but I found it incredibly ironic that a tale of a man in a perpetual state of travel would have a bookmark of an airline ticket in it. Granted, I have not read the book yet but I have seen the movie two or three times now and think it’s one of George Clooney‘s best performances to date.

So what did I see inside the front cover of “Slam”? An airline boarding pass! It was on a flight LEAVING from Tucson. Standing there, I was wondering if the previous owner had purchased the book at the Tucson airport or another airport along her travels from Tucson. I wonder how long after her flight she finished the book. Did she finish it on her flight? Did she have a lengthy lay0ver in another airport and got a chunk of it read while waiting? Did she only read it while in flight or did she nap on the flight? Was she a quick reader? Or was it months later, after her travels, that she finished it? Did she consider it a throwaway level of book? Obviously it must not have been one of her favorites, as it’s now sitting on the shelf next to half a dozen copies of the same book.

So, I salute you “Renee” (the name was on the boarding pass, people) and all the other previous owners of the books I love. Even though we may not be reading the same book at any given time, I feel good knowing that someone else enjoyed something like I did.

What used bookstores do YOU recommend? Do you have a preference on used books or mega-bookstores? Thoughts in the comments!