David Bashing

I didn’t want Tom Watson to win the British Open yesterday.

Watson had already won five British Opens. Would winning a sixth make a material difference in his life? I doubt it. Last week he was a golfing great, this week he’s a golfing great. Nothing changes because he lost.

Stewart Cink, on the other hand, has been playing golf for nearly 20 years without a major tournament win. It is likely that his win yesterday will be his one and only major victory, and that it will make a large difference in his life. He may never rise to the level of golfing great, but now he will always be Stewart Cink, British Open champion.

I’m happy for him. Am I the only one?

While Watson’s age made his challenge interesting, and gave a lift to many of his aged viewers, I am more comfortable in a world in which the old yield the floor gracefully to the young.

There was an accidental aspect to Watson’s moment in the sun, as if it was all unexpected, even by him, which contributed greatly to his appeal. In this he bears no resemblance to Lance Armstrong, the latest in a string of greats incapable of ceding the spotlight to others.

Armstrong returned to the Tour de France after setting every cycling record worth having. The only records left for him are those not worth having: most narcissistic, biggest megalomaniac.

Yet we root for him. Even the French!

We like to say we favor the underdog, look out for the little guy, but in practice we often prefer Goliath to David.

The Immortal Dead

Sitting in the restaurant, waiting for our order, the din is cut by a very young Michael Jackson’s voice over the sound system: “A-B-C / 1-2-3 / Baby you and me!” An amazing pop song.

What happened to that exuberant youth? He faded, literally, into the wraith who died last week. Died for the few who knew him, that is. For most of the millions who mourned, who knew him only through songs, he died forty years ago, or thirty years ago, or twenty years ago—their version of Michael Jackson died long before his body did.

The muse is so fickle, touching few, favoring then casting them aside, that I find myself mourning the death of many still-living artists who I know only through their art.

But with preservation and mechanical reproduction, their art lives on, so in a real sense each version of Michael Jackson will live forever, cutting through the din of crowded restaurants, grabbing us while we sit waiting for our orders.

Book With Legs

I read a lot. So much, in fact, I wonder whether it’s too much.

I live surrounded by books. Books I’ve read, books I want to read, books to which I refer, and too many books I borrowed or bought that I will never read but, in the interests of filling my newly expanded shelves, will probably continue to live with me.

I read more than books, of course, spending an hour or so every morning harvesting content from the internet that I read throughout the day. (As I recently detailed, I have a semi-automated typesetting apparatus that transfers these harvested articles from electrons into paper, permitting me to read them safe from the distracting allure of my flashing computer screen.)

There’s always something to read. I’m never satisfied. My brain’s a bottomless pit with a limitless capacity for more words. I feed it every chance I get.

I read instead of watching TV, preferring word consumption over image viewing.

I read while waiting, a practice that walls me off from the rest of you during my rare forays into the real world, such as waiting on line at the bank. Head buried deep in a book, oblivious to life, the bank could be robbed and I’d never know.

I read while walking, a sometimes dangerous practice that has, on occasion, torn my clothing, stubbed my toes and caused internal and external bleeding. For me and others.

I used to read while driving. Then I nearly killed myself by glancing at an article instead of braking. I reacted just in time. One more second, and who knows? So I started taking the bus and subway. It lengthened my two hour roundtrip commute to nearly three hours, but freed up two more hours each day to read.

I used to read while eating with others but, I since learned, this is rude to your eating companions. So I try to eat alone.

I used to read late into the night but this kept my wife awake and left me feeling groggy the next morning. So now I go to sleep one hour earlier and wake up two hours earlier, magically gaining an extra hour of reading each morning while avoiding the grogginess. I suspect that extra hour’s coming out of my life expectancy, but so long as I spend it reading who cares?

I’m a chain reader: on completing one piece of reading material my immediate reflex is to reach for the next piece instead of contemplating what I just read. I regret that, but there is so much to read, so little time to do it, so I must move ever on. I hope I’m sorting it all out in my subconscious.

In rare moments of repose, brought on by the temporary out-of-reachness of my next read, I wonder why I read so much. Is my reading a means to an end, or is it just an end in itself?

Perhaps I’ll find the answer in my next read.