Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Spring Break Chronicle Part I

Note - Here is the first part of a narrative I am writing on my spring break. From the looks of it, its going to be pretty long and boring, but hey, I need the writing practice. 

Part I - An Unnecessary Introduction

My high school yearbook features a page showing me curled up on a classroom floor in a blanket pretending to dream. Above it, a caption explains that if I could be anyone in the world for a day, I would be Lions quarterback Mike McMahon. The amount of information contained in that morsel of knowledge is huge. It shows, first and foremost, that I was an idiot (note: not “was” as in am no longer, but simply that I unequivocally was a documented fool). Secondly, it provides an extraordinary example of the Lions perpetually awful rotation at the quarterback position. And finally, it acknowledges that for some reason recently, which even I honestly can’t remember, I was leafing through my old high school yearbook (weird).

            However, this fact came to my attention when I recently considered how much I would love to be Bill Bryson. Really, Bill Bryson doesn’t have an extraordinary job. Rather, I feel like he has established a unique craft that has allowed him to carve out the niche job that I would love: writer about whatever tickles his fancy. He is largely known as a travel writer, and rightly so. However, he also has written works on the history of the world (literally the whole thing), his childhood imaginary super powers, Shakespeare, and a few quite enjoyable titles on the English language itself.

            And finally, from my high school yearbook to Bill Bryson, I found myself on the Appalachian Trail for the second consecutive Spring Break (yeah, that’s right, I’m still in school and the words Spring Break still mean something to me). Anyways, I read Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods while traveling in Spain and Morocco with my sister. I’m not sure if the experience was heightened due to the fact I was currently in travel mode, but the book quickly became one of my favorite reads. I even flirted with the option of hiking on the Appalachian Trail last summer before the medical-school-ambition-vampire convinced me that I should probably do something for my curriculum vitae (note: I still have no idea why medical students don’t call this a resume like the rest of the word, but I’m sure there is some archaic reason that tradition won’t let go of).

Click here for Part II

No comments: