THOUGHTS ON THE DEADPerhaps I am alone, or certainly feel that I am, in the experience of being brought to tears by some work of human creation that catches me where I am least comfortable being caught—in my own thoughts. This happens (and its embarrassing) to me most often at art museums. The wonder I feel when surrounded by what seem to be immortalized fits of passion cannot be reasoned with and although I generally try to keep my public sobs choked down, I feel that the time has come to address and celebrate the cause of my most pretentious swoonings.
    I am now seated on a plane, traveling between Fort Myers, Florida and Los Angeles, after an over-lengthy Christmas/New Years/Mother’s Birthday-vacation, that along with a trip to Boston earlier in the month left me in my Los Angeles home a total of 5 days. To say that I’m exhausted and wish to be back would be to call 55 car fires over three days a minor prank. But this is only to give insight into the physio-emotional state that I was in during the most airborne of my tearful experiences.
    During my cross continental trip, I was privileged to find a very pleasant used bookshop in Lexington, Kentucky where I purchased a copy of The Portable James Joyce, a collection of his works, minor and major, which includes full editions of Dubliners as well as Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. It also has a groovy green cover. I’ve read almost everything of his already (except Finnegan’s Wake, which even my James Joyce teacher in college [yes I had one and got an A-] told me to avoid) but it had been a while since I’ve read anything by him—the last time I can remember being when I was locked up in a rather unpleasant spa located in Elgin, Illinois, supposedly for my own, drunken good.
    Cut to the present day, January__, 2012. 2011 was a silly year for most Americans but was exceptionally so for me. I tried my hand at being wretchedly addicted to multiplayer video gaming, a choice which seemed relatively reasonable at the time and was made definitively pragmatic when I was offered a job, YES A JOB, playing video games full-time. Needless to say, the job was as truly stupid as it sounds and the company which wrote me nearly $20,000 in checks unfortunately realized this and has since stopped paying people to instruct others on how to most mindlessly waste their time. For somewhere between 40 and 50 hours a week, I was desk bound, controller in hand pwning (look it up, n00bs). As you can imagine, the voluntary gamer rarely finds time to snuggle up with the world’s great literature and the professional gamer finds even less. Thus it could be said that perhaps I gave up reading.
    But not on this plane ride.
    The Dead—probably JJ’s most famous short story—was my pick for the ride home. It recounts a night in the life of Gabriel Conroy, an educated Dubliner who’s as concerned with appearing intelligent as he is with not offending his vulgarian contemporaries with references to foreign (British) Literature at his Aunts’ yearly Christmas party. He has no peace within himself, as he feels that his education and intellectual pursuits separate him from the other party guests while at the same time feeling guilty for looking down on them.
    That is until the end of the story, when his wife tells him the tragic story of Michael Furey. Prior to the telling of Furey’s tale, Gabriel is consumed with desire for his wife, as well as a fear that over the years he has disappointed her as a mate. When she tells him the story, which nobody could ever do justice synopsizing, he is overwhelmed with jealousy and regret that he has never loved anyone or anything with the passion that Furey obviously felt for her. It also flicks at the scabs of his reason as he chokes down his jealousy in conversation with her about it. Its beautiful, its powerful and it pretty much sums up all the confusion and inspiration that go hand in hand with love.
    And when it came time for the last paragraph, I found myself panting, tears flowing down my face as the flight attendant poured me ginger ale and handed me some pretzels. Just like Gabriel Conroy I was talking myself down with reason “Crying like this is insane,” I thought, “I can’t let anyone see this.” While another voice (which had a thick Dublin accent) reminded me of how lucky I was to feel anything at all.