To Kill A Mockingbird With A Few Inches Of Snow

     The end of last week was an odd run of days that all started with a Thursday afternoon email from my daughter's English teacher.  The teacher was concerned about her current grade in the class and wanted to make sure she was prepared for her final essay on To Kill A Mockingbird.

     I had never crossed paths with the book when I was in school because my teachers chose other books for the class to read.  So in order to have a discussion about the book, I hightailed it to the White Whale bookstore in Bloomfield, after I was sprung from day job, to pick up a copy of To Kill A Mockingbird.

     The clerk at the store couldn't find the book even though the computer said there were three copies in the store.  The other employee in the store took the ever so helpful stance of “Well, I guess if it's not on the shelf then it's not in the store.” Thanks for the assist, chief.

     It turned out he was looking under “H” for Harper instead of “L” for Lee.  After I found the book myself, I handed over my legal tender and dove head first back into the shallow pool of rush hour traffic.

     After a quick dinner and a pause to admire the test pressing of Heart Burns by Laura Jane Grace that landed on my porch earlier in the day, it was time to tear into To Kill A Mockingbird.  The goal was to read the first half on Thursday and then finish the book on Friday in order to have some idea of what the hell my kid was talking about by Saturday afternoon.

     A pot of coffee and the recorded output of the Buzzcocks later, I was on page 170 of 323 with still enough time to catch the Daily Show before calling it quits for the night.  I figured it was time to close the book due to the fact that I could no longer focus or see straight and that might be helpful when reading.

     Friday was a repeat of Thursday except that I went for The Damned instead of the Buzzcocks.  I had been struggling with The Damned's The Black Album for years but I think I finally got it.  There's a lot going on with that record and my ears eventually opened up to it to great reward.

     By 11pm, To Kill A Mockingbird had been successfully ingested and now the challenge was to be able to talk about it academically.  For the past twenty years or so, my reading has been for the purposes of entertainment or curiosity.  The muscles of breaking down and discussing a novel have most certainly atrophied in my brain.  Especially since there has been a lot of years and miles from my last foray into academia.

     As I've gotten older, I've lost patience with trying to find the underlying meaning to someone's writing.  Put what you want to say on the page.  I don't have time to guess and stab in the dark about where you're trying to get to.  My middle finger is pointed at you Jack Kerouac.

     After a stop at Pamela's for lunch, on Saturday, it was time to crack open To Kill A Mockingbird.  It took a few hours but after some back and forth the kid felt better and more confident about having to write an essay during class on Monday.  She should be able to articulate the sexist undertones of the early 1900s without a problem.

     As I was heading across town to drop her back off at her mother's, the dreaded “snow storm of the century” or whatever the local news was calling it this time started to fall from the sky little by little.

     I was planning on heading back to the Rock Room that evening to check out Killer Of Sheep. They were playing with Mollusk and Lansbury.  Both bands that I knew nothing about but was eager to learn.

     There was no such luck on a salt truck coming past my house by the time I was ready to head out the door.  After a car slammed into my house last year when there were a few inches on the ground, I tend to want to hang around as much as I can to see if anyone thinks I need a hole in my living room. So sadly, for the second week in a row, no show for me.  That's what I get for buying a house that sits at the bottom of a hill.

     I must be getting back into the swing of things.  When I missed out on a show in recent years, I was usually apathetic about it.  Trying to find any reason to maintain my routine and let the depression win by keeping me on the couch.

     Now I experience regret on having to pass on the Punk Rock.  Hopefully, I'll be able to find a show to head out to next weekend.  Until then it'll be reading, writing and records, records and more records.