I have this friend who has tidy book shelves, everything in its place, alphabetically ordered and but much more than that, poetry here, fiction there, philosophy in its own place and it occurred to me that deconstructing book shelves could be a good sideline for a tired academic. Rather than writing the kind of books no one ever reads I could write a weekly column or do a weekly radio show. We speculated on what would happen if she switched her iPod onto shuffle and then by some Scrooge-like, Christmas ghostly trick she came home to her books all jumbled up like her songlists. She said, "...I'll come home to poems muddled in with philosophy and fiction in with reference books all in promiscuous juxtaposition and chatting about things they shouldn't even know about, and then what delightful chaos ..." And indeed, it does sound "delightful chaos". I suspect she would start tidying them back immediately but I like the idea of them all talking to each other for in some ways that is what I spend my life doing - making connections, making links and trying to make sense of the "delightful chaos". And as I look back at this year, I gave my professorial, inaugural address (5 years late but that's an other story) and it was a story about making sense in the face of chaos. I am now re-writing it to be published (by Text Journal) but here is a clip: In December 2006 I was sitting in an Airport lounge in New York with my son Dan, waiting for a connection to Miami – yes, I know, we lead such exotic lives but we plant lots of trees. Anyway, Dan was working on a laptop computer, writing his epic novel and I was re-reading a novel. Waiting around for connections isn’t such a chore, I like airports. I like the anticipation of travel as well as the cross-cultural-continent-crossing mingle of people carrying stories to and from somewhere else. Just try to picture that idea if you can, buses, boats, cars, trains and planes criss-crossing countries with all of their passengers and crew carrying stories of some kind; a holiday memory; a business meeting; a chance encounter in a Manhattan restaurant, a haggled for bargain in a market in Marrakesh…! And it’s not all just good stories of course, though we don’t need to dwell on those others here – goodness knows there will time enough in our lives for them. For the point is that we are a storytelling species, stories define our existence and separate us from the other life forms on this planet of ours. The rich intertextuality of life, which we all experience daily (in the good, bad and other more mundane times) is part of the narrative that sustains our continuing sense of being, in the communities in which we co-exist. Of course being in a busy airport lounge provides a different sense of community, but as a storyteller I never feel disconnected from it. Invariably, when I am in public spaces I pause to look up at those fellow travellers, the constantly changing faces who might form the basis of a character in a story of my own. And indeed so it happened. No sooner had I peeked over the pages of my book when I spied a nun. Nothing remarkable in this, of course, nuns fly just like everybody else - except that I noticed she was wearing a pair of “kitten heels” I wasn’t shocked or anything, I was just intrigued and I found myself smiling and asking, “…what’s the story, there, then,” because that is what this life is about. It’s about “story”; it’s about “story telling” and “telling stories” in this new and exciting, 21stCentury. But it’s also about making connections, seeing how the world is pieced together because it’s the connections that give us the sense and rationale; it’s the connections that make the difference between knowledge and ignorance, between innocence and experience and like the nun in kitten heels, and like life itself, the connections are full of paradoxes and surprises. And I love this image and the way it it tells its own story:
And if I am honest I have to say I loved 2009, its been a very good year and if 2010 is better than I am going to be a very lucky man - perhaps ageing has brought this on, I don't know, but if they can bottle it I will let you know. In the meantime the story goes on, like the time I was driving south from Orange County, Los Angeles, following the Pacific line down through Southern California, into San Diego, taking the Tijuana crossing into the North West of Mexico. Like I say, I have lead a charmed life... in delightful chaos... ps - the picture at the top wasn't taken yesterday - I was so much wiser then, I am younger than that now... though I am delighted to say I still have those jeans, they are a bit more ragged now - fashionable holes in the knees but the good news is they still fit... so here is a song to celebrate:
