The Toddler Also Rises (And Wakes Up Daddy)

Well I've finally done it. My dirty little secret is officially a thing of the past. After 30 years on this Earth, I have finally read an Ernest Hemingway novel. You know, one of the most important influences on the development of the short story and novel in American fiction. The guy that seized the imagination of the American public like no other twentieth-century author ... and other praise I'm copying straight out of his "About the Author" section!

This has always been a shameful fact I've kept hidden away. Along with the facts that I can't swim and I've never been able to effectively blow bubbles without spitting gum across the room. But don't tell anyone.

The fact that I had never actually read a Hemingway novel is inexcusable. As a thriving ex-journalist, I should have flocked to him like a groupie. After all, Hemingway is perhaps the most famous and accomplished ex-journalist of all time. Right alongside Stephen King and John Tesh. And he lived in Idaho for crying out loud!! How many Pulitzer Prize-winning authors have lived in Idaho? Anyone? Hello?

Here's the problem. For some reason Hemingway has earned a reputation as a larger-than-life figure that requires special powers of brilliance to comprehend. April still recalls the time her high school class spent an entire month pouring over the religious symbolism within "The Old Man and the Sea." You can't even say the name "Hemingway," without triggering a reflex that forces you to stroke your chin and mumble, "Yes. Hemingway. Indeed."

I've also made the mistake in the past of trying to read other "classic" authors such as Charles Dickens and Dostoevsky. I needed smelling salts and strong electric currents to shock me out of my coma. Snoozers all.

So, while spending a rare childless afternoon at Barnes and Noble last week, I decided to take the plunge. I was going to purchase a Hemingway novel and I was going to read it! I would endure every last religious symbol and obscure reference that I was clearly not brilliant enough to understand. I would take it like a man and pretend that I understood every word!

I went home that evening, said a little prayer, and began reading. It took about two pages before I blurted out, "Why didn't anybody tell me he was awesome!!" This is a guy who wrote after every red-blooded male's heart. He had it all - fishing, alcohol, bull fights, girls, more alcohol, exotic trips into the mountains, even more alcohol, tennis, and drunken antics fueled by alcohol.

I'm not sure where this high-brow reputation came from, but Ole' Ernie was a fun-loving SOB who wrote entire novels filled with simple sentences like, "It was always pleasant walking over the bridge at sunset," and "So we sat and thought deeply for a while." Crazy stuff! I don't know about you, but I've never in my life sat with someone silently and "thought deeply for a while." I love it!

I read "The Sun Also Rises" in three days, and I followed that by reading "The Old Man and the Sea" today while Michael took a nap. It felt fine to be reading and happy .... See, there I go. I can't help myself. The ghost of Ernie has taken over my soul. This very moment I'm fighting off a compulsion to guzzle two bottles of wine and chase it with a whiskey sour. If they had a bull-fighting channel I'd be watching it right now, while downing three beers and a shot of bourbon.

So here's to you, Ernest Hemingway. I plan to spend the next few weeks devouring your novels and ridding myself of three decades of guilt. Anyone got any leather wine-bags?

Sit and think deeply for a while kiddies!

- Dave