Rock Island Line by David Rhodes (most life changing books txt) 📗

there’re so many things to learn is all the more reason. Hisnegative self tried to argue that just having fun was more important than learning, but he amazed himself with how easily he could push that begging objection aside. He was getting stronger, he felt. It was easier to decide on doing things—easier to deny the opiate of inactivity. His restful moments lately had been filled with laying the foundations for more projects.

But just as he was settling down with his back to a large rock with moss and lichen growing on it, with a feeling of pleasant self-contentedness, he remembered that he felt left out: Mal had her painting and there was no denying how absorbing and forward-moving it was. It was work, learning and enjoyment all at once. And what did he have? He could no more paint than fly to the moon.

Perhaps I could learn to play a musical instrument, he thought. But the idea of making squawking noises off by himself in some room was very disheartening. I’d never be any good, he complained. Sure, I like music well enough, but people who’re good at something—who have it in them—don’t start out when they’re twenty-two; by then they’re well on their way.

Wait a minute, he thought. The world wasn’t created only for artists. Others belong in it just as rightfully, and there was nothing that stood in his way any more than in anyone else’s which kept him from extracting its full pleasures. There was an obstacle but wasn’t it the same for everyone? Inactivity, stagnation and the unwillingness to delve into experiences for understanding. He resolved to get a book about trees as well, decided to build a lean-to so that they could sleep outside overnight and set about gathering poles to make it with and finding stones to lay in a circle for a fireplace—not rocks from the creek because those might explode.

Later that afternoon Mal came down the hill looking for him and he had an opportunity to watch her unobserved as she walked along, concealed behind a small thicket of hawthorn. Her expression and movements were much less animated, as he imagined his were when he was alone. She stopped and looked at something on the ground and examined it seriously, then stood up and lookedaround for him. He called out, and together they finished piling the brush onto the lean-to and sat inside when it was finished.

They went back to the house to eat dinner and get matches, returned, had a fire and listened to the whippoorwills and night insects. The yellow flames subsided, leaving only the redness of the glowing coals. The sky grew brighter. The wildness of their little woods seemed to surround them. They lay together without speaking, but July could sense Mal was ready to talk; something was bothering her—not to the degree of worry, but enough to keep her from the silent participation he was enjoying. He sat up and put on some more wood, giving her the opportunity to break the silence.

“I was wondering,” she began. “I don’t know if I can find just the right words to say what I mean, but is this all there is?”

“Is what?”

“Our lives. I mean is this all there is to it, just working and keeping the house fixed up and having pets and sometimes enjoying things and sometimes not for this reason or another—is that all?”

“Wow. Really, I don’t understand what you mean—or maybe I’m afraid to. Whenever I try to think about what you’re saying, it seems like something terrible.”

“I knew you’d think that. It’s not that way. All I mean is that I feel sometimes that there should be more—something that we would always be working towards. What we’re doing now, is that what everybody else does, and is it the same thing for them, so on blah blah? Doesn’t it seem that somehow there must be more? Because this can’t be really living. Really living must be something else entirely. But maybe there isn’t such a thing as that—oh, I hope you’re understanding all this in the right way. Maybe there isn’t such a thing as really living at all, only just being alive.”

“Maybe,” said July sorrowfully, looking down into the fire.

“Oh no, silly. This isn’t anything against you or against the way we live. Can’t you understand that? It’s not really against anything. Here, let me ask you this: do you think we’re normal people?”

“Sure.”

“What do you mean, sure?”

“Sure—of course we are—if the other choice is abnormal. We’re physically and mentally all here, therefore normal.”

“Is that all normal means to you?”

“What else can it mean?” There was a defensive tone to his voice, but at least, thought Mal, he’s arguing.

“I’ve always thought we were sort of special.”

“In what way?”

“Very individual and one of a kind. Worthy of admiration just for what we are.”

“That’s just the way you think of yourself.”

“No, both of us. We’re together. But what I was trying to say is that I used to think we were special, and now I see us sometimes as being ordinary—just another couple living in the country, getting by—”

“Do you mean we should have financial careers, or see more of the world and have more friends, or have children, or what?”

“None of those things—they’d just be more of the same.”

“Somehow I can’t help thinking that what you’re saying is very snobbish.”

“But it’s not!”

“You’d probably like to live around more painters.”

“You’re the one who feels snobby about painting, not me. I just like to do it. You think it’s so important.”

“I was thinking about it today,” admitted July, “and wondered for a while if I shouldn’t learn how to play a banjo—so I could have something. But I decided to learn more and do more instead. I’m going to get some books on birds and trees.”

“You always think so constructively,” laughed Mal. “I guess that’s my trouble. I always tend to blame things outside myself instead of finding something to do about bad feelings. .