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November 19, 2002
mark thomas I wrote this long, long story. It was called "Boring," and it was about how only the boring get bored, and how you could be ugly, stupid, stinky or obnoxious but the worst thing you could ever be is boring. Well, that story seems to have vanished. It was probably too long, but I liked it. I've been jetting back and forth between here and Tampa over the last many weeks. I'm too emotionally exhausted over everything to even talk about it or recount the story any more. There's a happy ending, but I guess it would be dishonest to just jump to that part of the story. So never mind. That reminds me of a Peanuts comic strip I saw once. Snoopy on top of his dog house is typing a love letter, and in the first frame he says (paraphrasing) "Words can not express my love for you..." In the next frame he says "...so forget it." That sounds like my style of romance. I've had passing notions the last few weeks of moving to another place. Another city or town. It seems like conversations with people about places to live, particularly with people who live in places other than where I live, usually become testy and even competitive. I had a chat with an old college friend a few weeks ago. I told him I still live in New York, but was thinking of moving elsewhere, and his response was to talk about how great his town was and how he could set me up with a house and a job and on and on. I basically said the climate over there wasn't for me, but he couldn't understand why I didn't want to live his life by moving to the same town and working at the same company and just living an exact copy of his life. "Why don't you want to live my life?" I imagined him saying. I think I can understand that point of view, if "point of view" is a fair term to describe it. I used to be like that myself about New York. If someone told me they lived in Boston my reflex thought was "And you're not embarrassed to tell me this? New York is the only city anyone would want to live in? Why would anyone want to live anywhere but New York?" ... and other patently stupid thoughts. I don't know if I've matured or mellowed or both, but I don't expect anyone to believe me when I say that my town is the only town worth living in, nor do I believe one who boasts at great length about the greatness of their life. It's not so much that I don't believe people who boast about their happiness or their hometown, but it does make me uncomfortable. It makes me curious as to why such effort and grandiloquence is needed to explain an aspect of life that I assume would be a point of contentment rather than anxious defensiveness. I can understand civic or hometown pride, but it always seems to go toward absolutes, in which no other town could ever be so perfect for any human. Here is a picture I took of a poem stuck to a North Boulevard lightpost in Tampa: WHAT A BUNCH OF CRAP! It's getting cold here. I might try and sell my old Baldwin piano. The Roland digital has worked out so well that I don't think I need the 2nd one any more. I also want to buy a car, and am now thinking along the lines of a new or slightly used Toyota Camry. I need to straighten up this apartment. People are coming to visit the during the next several days. This is pretty unusual around here, but it happens.
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