In the Beginning there was . . .

Hello and welcome. Though I have already made one posting I consider this to be the inaugural address of The Dismal Reeder. While there is much to cover I expect I won’t get to all of it. I’ve got laundry running and I’m sure that getting up to throw stuff in the dryer will cause me to forget some brilliant sentence, anecdote or idea. And, might I add, that this is no small task, because I know my audience. Not only will my mom be reading this very attentively, but also the Dixons, Simmons, and one Eldridge-Burns. All of the above are very adept with words. There’s a lot of pressure. I keep thinking of a cartoon boiler about to explode; swelling and shaking violently, whistling as it shoots rivets from its seams. Hopefully this will be a boiler that doesn’t explode, but instead gives out a final, anticlimactic cough and wheeze as it sags forward in a tired slouch. If I’m going to explode there are a couple souls I’d like to take with me. But I don’t want to get into a discussion about the merits of suicide bombing. My good friend Lewis came up with the name “The Dismal Reeder,” which is a clever play on Economics’ alternate name, “The Dismal Science,” and my name, Reed. I myself am not dismal at all. Quite the contrary. Give me a few weeks in econ graduate school and the title could be more literal than I would like.

I suppose I should cover the drive first. It was long. Southern Idaho sucks. Wyoming sucks until you get to the Medicine Bowl. All of Kansas, that I saw, sucks. And “I’ll be dead in the cold, cold ground before I recognized Mizzourah.” John Mateer assured me that all of Kansas does not, in fact, suck. According to him there are places in Kansas where all you can see for miles are sunflowers. I saw no sunflowers, John. It was a let down. What I did see in Kansas were lots of billboards along I-70 about Jesus and abortion; all the same old sayings. You know: “Jesus is the way” and “Jesus died for us,” and ‘ain’t you glad your momma chose life?’ But the best one was a head shot of Jesus in a wheat field holding a wheat stock. No words. It made me want a billboard along a heavily traveled interstate. What better way to force people to look at your nonsense? Most of them are probably desperate for stimulus anyway.

By far the best part of the drive was seeing John Mateer and Robert Story along the way. I wish I had more time with both. Having not seen John in four or so years, it was especially nice to get to sit down with him and catch up. John works the night shift saving lives in the emergency room. He had to work the night I arrived so our time was limited to a few hours the next morning, but I wouldn’t trade those hours for the world. John has the heartiest, most genuine laugh in all of Creation, and it’s addicting, quite possibly the heroine of laughs. Lucky for me I lived with Jake Lewis in Woodstock and had some good stories to share so I could get my fix. I already miss it.

The problem with spending as much time as possible in Boulder with John was that it cut into my time for visiting with Robert in Topeka. I did get to sit and talk with him during a trip he made to Portland a few months before my journey so it was not a Hey-I-haven’t-seen-you-since-high-school-and-I-know-I-didn’t-get-in-until-11pm-and-you-have-to-work-in-the-morning-but-thanks-for-shacking-me-up-for-a-night situation. But it would have been nice to be able to sit down to a leisurely dinner and beer with my friend. In the end I can’t thank the two of them enough for providing me with places to stay along the way. Knowing that there was a friendly, familiar face ahead at the next rest stop made the trip infinitely better.

Now that I’m here and settling myself in, it seems less and less insane that I’m 2100 miles away from home in a strange town about to start graduate school. As I write this I have two days left before our week long orientation begins. The humidity is not as bad as I expected and quite tolerable. Urbana itself is a charming little place. There is a beautiful historic district with as many trees as any neighborhood in Portland that I travel on my way to campus. My apartment is fabulous. It’s amazing how when you’re paying for it, you avoid turning on lights like you’re allergic. I have a big living room and decent sized bedroom with a wee kitchen, plenty big for one person, in between and off to the side. I have yet to meet anyone from my building.

I realize that this is probably getting a little boring. ‘I did this . . .’ ‘There is this . . .’ and so on. I can’t say I’ve had an experience worthy of being written about. I talked to a Mormon guy on campus for a little bit. We’d been discussing how many faiths there are and he tried to tell me that Mormonism was the one true faith because he prayed about it and God said that it was. I said, ‘good for you, but my understanding is that the Book of Mormon is the weirdest of them all.’ He claimed it was no stranger than the Old Testament. And to that I must say, “Touché.” The Old Testament is down right strange. And yet, within all that weirdness, religion has set itself up well to assert its legitimacy. The Mormon even said that just like many of the Old Testament prophets and their followers, the Mormon prophet and his followers are seen by the masses as being loonies. “Clever girl,” I say with an Australian accent.

Well Sir, the time to rap this up is nigh as I’m starting to ramble. Sometimes when I write, a feeling comes upon me that says, “Hey, Jerk Off, quit wasting their time. Where do you get off, eh?” And I always know that the belligerent, New York Italian guy in my head is right. It’s time to call it a day and wait until next time.

My vision for this blog is small updates, a few sentences to a few paragraphs, mixed in with larger “articles” or “stories” that I’ve attempted to write well. That way this blog might be something interesting to read instead of being my own glorified Twitter. Much love to everyone.

Post Script: It is now two days later. The reason for the posting delay is that the person in my building with “free” wireless rudely password protected it. What’s the world coming to these days?