My host’s name is Martin Grant. He’s an ad executive here in the city, and his life is pretty figured out. He’s thirty years old, single, no prospects, as near as I can tell. I don’t have access to his thoughts or anything, but there’s no pictures in his house, no mementoes on the wall. Nothing to indicate there’s a girl or guy or whatever in his life. He seems completely normal, which I guess is good.
In my life, I’ve met some messed up people. Some come from being born into bad families, some come from good familes and bad friends, some have good families, and good friends, but... outside influences... act upon them. I’ve met a few of those, and there’s nothing I can do to help them.
Martin’s just a guy. Lonely, single, not even a pet. Goes to bed early, wakes up early, works a lot. I stumbled across him one day through sheer chance, and he seems the kind of guy who would want to help me with my particular problem. I know he can’t- he doesn’t know I exist, or that I’m using him for my own nefarious purposes (joke), but I’ve seen him with his friends, and I think he’d be willing to help me out if there was some way I could communicate with him.
Yes, alright, yes. I know I could just leave him a message on his computer, but you know how that would end just as well as I do, and I’d be right back where I am, with no one to help me.
So, this blog. I’m not sure why I’ve taken up my metaphorical pen. I want to tell you about Kari, certainly, and I suppose I should mention Colby, because without both of them, I wouldn’t be currently embroiled in the situation I’m in now.
I also need to talk a bit about what’s going on in my, for lack of a better word, life now, so I may- ha ha- be jumping back and forth between the past and present quite a bit. Hope that doesn’t bother you- whoever you are.
Also, that joke I just made? You don’t get it now, but you will. Part of the fun of being chrono-nomadic (which is what I’ve termed my lifestyle) is that you can make punchlines before the joke.
(I should mention that I arbitrarily chose this date and this year to make these blog posts. I could have made them any time. I chose May of two thousand twelve because why not?)
That doesn’t mean I stay in this date and time. As I mentioned, I’m a chrono-nomad, so I tend to flit around, and visit other times. This can lead to certain amounts of embarassment, as you’ll see. Like the first time I met the Officiant.
So now I guess we’re talking about me a bit. You’ll need something to call me, so we might as well get that out of the way.
Call... me... Ishmael.
No, on second thought, don’t do that. That’s not my name. I don’t even particularly like that name. Bit old fashioned for me, really. Of course, I’m a bit old fashioned myself, so I guess it fits, and you could conceivably get away with calling me whatever you like, since, technically, I don’t have a name, but don’t call me Ishmael.
We’re going to be spending the next little while together, so you should know all about me. Of course, that’s what this blog is all about, I suppose. Who I am. Perhaps, more accurately, what I am. What I am, though, is a pretty simple question. When it comes down to who, that’s a bit more complicated.
It’s really kind of a moral quandary, that question. Jean Valjean asked it in the transcendent novel Les Misérables, and also in that excrementally runny, bloated piece of drivel that Mackintosh threw together. He learned of a man who had been arrested because the authorties thought he (the man) was him (Valjean). Valjean, who had a pretty cushy life at the time, was faced with a quandary: 1, keep up the cushy life and let one man hang for my crimes, even though I’ll get to go free and take care of all the people under my care, or 2, go and tell the authorities they have the wrong guy, because I am the right guy, give up my cushy life, let all the people dependant on me suffer.
Valjean ultimately chose to free the man and condemn himself, except he later escaped, so not really, and I want to tell you that I’ve been faced with that same kind of moral choice hundreds of times over my long life. Maybe thousands. I kind of stopped keeping track after Kari. It’s not like it matters which you choose anyway. Either way, someone is saved, and someone else isn’t, and either way, it tears a little bit at your soul, and when soul is all you have...
Sorry, Kari.
Hmmm. A rhyme. I’m a poet and don’t realize it.
Anyway, I suppose that’s a story I’ll get to in time. It’s not like I really have anything else to do.
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