The Man Who Made Lists: Not a Book Review

I recently finished The Man Who Made Lists by Joshua Kendall about the life of Peter Mark Roget and I don't know what to say exactly.

I was hoping this book would be a kickstart to me to attack the pile of language books I have languidly lying around my bookshelves, but not so.

From the first pages, I was writing "awwwww" in the margins because the front and back sheets are his handwritten list of animal names in Latin and English.

The book goes through his biography, and I don't like how it's written, like the author had a Pastwatch-esque ability to know where Roget is looking and what he is thinking as he walks down the road or in the middle of a meeting. I know there are records and he could have explained it after the fact, but I just don't buy it and it distracts me to throw in details about the buildings he passes and their little histories.

Whatever. So I identify with him, and he was destined to go on the Cool Guys List from the first cracking open of the book. So his life is tragic, and it makes me worry that I can try to organize the world in my little way, try to contribute to some field, realize the kind words someone once told me, that I am "a solution in search of a problem." And I will contribute, probably, but it won't stop my life from being terrible for no apparent reason, and it won't stop me suffering from debilitating personal issues that don't allow me to appreciate my many blessings or accomplishments. What I'm saying is, I'm really looking forward to the rest of my life. Thanks, book.

I mean, Peter Mark Roget was a serious genius, and put his hands into all sorts of medical and botanical classification projects, and now his name is (oh my, better write this one down) synonymous with Thesaurus-type reference books, but those are just word indices and lack the vision that his original system had about who would use his book and why and how.

RESOLUTION: To seek out an original-ish version of Roget's Thesaurus, in a rare books room in Portland or elsewhere. To see the original layout, to see the systems and sub-systems. To touch a page, even if through gloved fingers. To be inspired or not by it. Begin.

Bad Things and Life Plans

Things are not so bad. It's odd, actually. I make plans in my head all the time, and when I was home for graduation parties my brother said he does the same, and even if its for small stupid things it runs my day when it doesn't happen. Right before I graduated I said that it was the end of the world, the photo album of the last week of school was 'end of my life,' and I meant it. 

In 5th grade they made me create a life plan, imagining what I would do and where I would be. I said I was a paleontologist and found an important bone which linked something together with something unrelated and got an award. I threw the award in there, and I was thinking at the time that it was all so optimistic and that would probably never happen, it takes years of patience and different projects to get good at excavating, luck, timing, just generally not very likely to get an award.  In high school I said I would be a botanist in South America, looking for medicinal cures in exotic amazonian plants, again, finding success. But let's be honest here, they made me make those plans, they were not things I didn't even think mattered like, "i think i'll get a saint cupcake today, and if i don't i'll be pissy to no end even though that's a stupid plan." (thankfully i DID eat all the MF ING delicious little cupcakes I ate within 2 hours of purchase. 

What I'm saying is, I don't have a life plan, and it doesn't bother me because I didn't think I had one. I am being a little upper middle class princess about what a pain it has been to find housing and a job, but really, I didn't have a fantasy right-after-college plan so it's fine. I never thought I would go to Europe or cross the country, go home or anything. In fact, the plan has always been to mope around in Portland until I feel like it. So this is the plan. Huh. Anyway, I thought I would share other things that are in my life plan, because instead of having a career, I have very small goals that could happen anytime anywhere in my lifespan. (Which I still secretly believe/fear will end before I am 30, so you know.)

I want to live and work in England for more than 6 months, and have some friends there, at least 1, so I'm not all on my own.

I want to visit the pandas at the Wolong Panda Reserve in Chengdu, China. They all survived the earthquake and they are thinking of moving them somewhere else, but I'd like to go where ever they all end up.

I want to try out for Jeopardy when I am 25, 27, 28, or 29. I didn't do it in college, because in college they expect you to know everything, and that is too much pressure.

If I can, I want to help buy my mother's family's home in France, I think in Angouleme. It's not much of a house and it's apparently feet away from a highway, but it makes my mother happy so I want to help.

If I had a large mansion it would include: secret passageways (there is a real company that does this: hiddenpassageway.com!) an armillary sphere, a large library, billiards table, pinball machine, moon globe, spiral staircase, furnished attic, furnished basement, dumb waiter, moving sidewalk (no matter how short) bernese mountain dog puppy, fennec fox, a bridge in the backyard over some sort of creek or stream, typewriter, slurpee machine.

Maybe a hybrid car.

Maybe go to: Great Rift Valley, the Artic (for the polar bears), India, Germany, Sweden (for Anders), Egypt, Santa Croce in Florence (for Galileo), Inner Mongolia (for Genghis), St. Petersberg (for Mendeleev), Moscow (for Prokofiev)

People I would like to meet: Stephen Fry, Jason Schwartzman, Zach Condon, members of Dispatch, Will Shortz, David Mamet, Orson Scott Card, Sergio Aragones,  Billy Collins.

People I would like to see in concert I haven't seen: Jason Schwartzman (Coconut Records), Zach Condon, Dispatch, Danny Elfman, Jon Brion, Fiona Apple, Regina Spektor, Rufus Wainwright, Presidents of USA, Coldplay, Jason Mraz, Lily Allen, the Arcade Fire, Barenaked Ladies, Ben Kweller, Squirrel Nut Zipper, Radiohead, Panic at the Disco, Neutral Milk Hotel, Missy Elliott, Moldy Peaches, Juanes, Jill Sobule, Ima Robot, Harry and the Potters

Things aren't so bad, there's just so much that could be happening. GET OUT OF THE SHIRE.