The Solomon Code

This is probably the last blog I will be doing from home for a while.  I’m not even doing this blog on my own computer, because it is currently packed away with most of my earthly possessions in a set of cars, preparing for a two-day trip down to the other side of the States.  

For those of you not yet aware, I’m moving to Texas to pursue graduate study in English.  And given the sheer distance involved, it’s unlikely I’ll be able to come home as often as I did at college.  I’ve known this move was coming for a long time, but somehow, having my computer packed away (along with my lamp, bed, and personal library) brings it home and gives it a real sense of finality.  For the past month, I’ve been telling myself “This might be the last time I see these people for a couple months,” but it never really seemed concrete.  Even now, it has a sense of unreality to it.

I wonder if this is indicative of something, of whether I’m a person who only really lives in the present, and only deals with the future in an abstract sense (though really, how many other ways are there to deal with the future?).  Even when I know certain events like this are coming, even when I spend months preparing for them, it’s still something of a surprise when they actually do come.

It’s that way with a lot of things right now.  I’m going off to grad school, sure, but my younger brother and sister are running off to college, one of them just starting, the other preparing to finish.  My older brother just bought a house and is slaving away at refurbishing it.  My sister-in-law graduated from nurses’ med school today and is looking at starting a new job before too much longer.  My Mom and Dad are looking to move away from the neighborhood and set up shop closer to my Dad’s work.  In this case, too, as I might not get back home for several months, chances are pretty good that several of these changes will happen in my absence.  I might be coming home to an entirely new house.  Changes.  Tons of changes, which I can really only think of on a conceptual basis, as if they were stories that might be fun to read.

Not sure how common that way of looking at the future is.  I know I have an odd tendency to look at life in terms of stories… what might make for a nice scene, how a prospective dialogue might play out, what would be the most thematically appropriate way to approach a situation, yadda yadda yadda.  Whether that’s due to the English major or just a side-effect of too many imaginary friends as a child (shoot, forget imaginary friends, I had imaginary ARMIES), but it’s practically an instinctive reaction by this point.  Whenever I think of something I might do in the future, I think out a story draft of it.  If I’m just relaxing and enjoying things, I might get into dialogue and plot twists.  If I’m being nervous, I’ll probably work out technical details.  But it’s always a story.  Real-life, but a story.  Non-fiction.

The mindset has its advantages and its drawbacks, naturally.  I think at times I handle stress differently than others, just because its part of the natural struggle that the hero (aka Me) must undergo.  On the other hand, it also makes me confused and frustrated at odd intervals, when things do NOT go according to the plot.  I know I often balk at certain courses of actions or certain ways of approaching a problem, just because they’re not how things would be handled in a story.  Or at least not any I would write.

Which, I suppose, is the chief consideration.  I’m writing my story the way I would… living my life as myself, essentially.  If you want to get esoteric, you could say that actually, I’m living life as the character I envision of myself.  But really, isn’t that what most people do?

Anyway, this is getting confusing.  Story of my life.  I’m entering a new chapter now, one that I can honestly say I’m excited about.  Not entirely sure what the plot will be, or what characters I’ll encounter, but I intend to write it as well as I can.