Goodbye J.D. Salinger

The Catcher in the Rye - Chapter 22

"You know that song 'If a body catch a body comin' through the
rye'? I'd like-"
"It's 'If a body meet a body coming through the rye'!" old Phoebe
said. "It's a poem by Robert Burns."
"I know it's a poem by Robert Burns."
She was right though. It is 'If a body meet a body coming through the rye.'
I didn't know it then though. "I thought it was 'If a body catch a body' I
said."
"Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around - nobody big, I mean - except me. and I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff - I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day, I'd be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be. I know it's crazy"


Probably the most dog-eared book I have. The copy is worn and faded like a favorite wallet. This book was the first piece of real literature that I loved. I connected with it. Something about it clicked, and my world was not the same after. When I heard of Salinger's passing earlier this week, my first reaction was 'I did not know he was still alive'. Then a sigh ran through me and gave me a chill - like I had just heard of the passing of a old friend that you lost touch with. The kind of reaction that makes you want to pull out the old photo albums and look at old pictures. Except this time it is not an album. It is a dog-eared paperback with their name on the cover. Goodbye J.D. Salinger. Thank you for being my catcher in the rye.

Reunion chapter 1

Twenty years. TWENTY YEARS! 20 years? Has it really been that long? Well, it actually has. Later this year, my high school class will celebrate our 20 year reunion. It is sinking in slowly and somewhat painfully. Where do I begin? Well first off, I have never been one to care about my age so I am not dwelling on the fact that I am 20 years removed from HS. I also do not have any trepidation about how my former classmates will judge how I look, the car I drive, where I work or any of the other specifics of my life right now. I like my life, I like who I have become and except for some poundage I am happy with the way that I look. So then what is the big deal right? Well, I think it comes down to the fuzzy past. You know what I am talking about, how the memory of how it was 20 years ago is so much better than it actually was. There is so much I have forgotten and so much that I am most likely mis-remembering. I do know that my perspective on things from that time is very different no matter how I remember it. We lamented that we were stuck in a dead end town, that life was passing us by, and that if these were the best years of our lives then we were not all that jazzed about the future. Of course what you can tell an 18 year old and what they will believe are totally different things. While I would not trade all of HS for the two greatest moments of my life (births of my two sons), HS was not nearly as horrible as we thought. The world was simpler either in fact or in perception due to our narrow worldview, and we were under no pressure other than what we brought on ourselves. So, getting back to now and the impending event. I am not sure why I have a few butterflies over this. Maybe it is because on some level, I would like to keep remembering the people I lost touch with as they were back then. That the room will not be filled with old friends, old enemies and old acquaintances, but with strangers who happen to have a 20 year old picture in my yearbook (yearbook - that is a whole other blog altogether). Twenty years. More on this to come.