Seeing Everything

First, I didn't get the little apartment. But I am on a waiting list for another apartment complex and I'm going to see another one today.

Second, I've come to the understanding that I can't know everything. I used to worry all the time that I needed to know the current events of every news story or I'd sound like an idiot when people were talking about what's happening in, say, Argentina.

For a time, I would get the New York Times on my Kindle and would try to read the whole thing, every day. That proved a feat, mainly because I need to realize I'm not a fast reader. Then I decided I would just get the New Yorker, which comes out weekly, and read it on Sunday mornings. But I must freely admit - I get bored really easily with most news stories. I can read an entire book about constructing word puns but I can't read half-a-page about Russia's legal system.

I have several articles clipped from both the Times and the New Yorker, but I haven't read them. One is about Franz Kafka - and you would think I would have been ALL OVER that article. Nope. I don't know if it's because it's an article and not a book or whether it's because I feel like I'm forcing myself to read and that feels like school and I never read any of my assignments for school so why should I do it now?

I think I've said this before, but I hate reading short stories. There's something about them, something limited, that I find frustrating. I think it stems back to something a former professor said about my short stories - she always felt like there was more to be told. She said my stories didn't feel contained, like they were all part of a longer story and like they were all interconnected. I've taken that with me, because I feel that way, too.

But back to feeling like I should know everything. I'm just not interested in current events. I mean, sometimes I am, don't get me wrong. I know there are certain stories I'd be a fool not to follow. But there are times when I'll be in a conversation about, for example, the Indiana governer's race and I get a vibe the other person thinks I should totally know all about each candidate. Because, you know, they know all about each candidate because they follow that story closely. So shouldn't I be following it closely? Wow, how can anyone now know who's running and what they stand for or don't or what kind of mud they wallowed in once upon a time?

The truth is I shouldn't care what I know vs. what they know. Do they know how to construct a perfectly rhythmed sentence? Do they know how to take two seemingly unrelated objects or ideas, construct a hierarchy, and compare them to create a unique and intriguing metaphor? Do they know people used to think male possums impregnated the females through their noses because the male has a forked penis?

A lot of people have told me throughout the course of my life that I think outside of the box. Maybe that's because I seek information in places that don't come packaged, air-mailed, and stamped with a message to open immediately. The other day I drove to the library (the first time I had driven in FOUR MONTHS) and picked up three random books - two fiction and one non-fiction. They are books few other people have probably read, that have probably only been checked out once before, if ever. I'm excited to read them. I will probably find nuggets of wisdom, because in obscurity is where I always find wisdom, and I will be happy with my little discovery of the knowledge gained in a moment of spontaneity.