Fall is finally here, which for me means I have time to read. Normally, during the summer, I may try to sit outside and get a few pages in, but inevitably, my eye is drawn to something that needs to be mowed, weeded, planted, or pruned. Between the chickens and two dogs, the backyard needs only one day to start to smell a little ripe in the warmer months, so suffice it to say that, between writing, the business, and my job as a semi-official groundskeeper, April through September is a pretty busy time around here. 

So on Saturday, when a day-long drizzle moved in, I was thrilled to turn on the fake fire, put a mug of IPA at my shoulder, and settle in to re-read The Lord of the Rings. I made it all the way from Bag End to the Council of Elrond at Rivendell by the time dinner rolled around. 

Reading The Lord of the Rings each autumn has become a tradition of mine over the years. I’m not sure why. Maybe it is because the action in the series begins in the Fall as Frodo and company set out from Hobbiton. Perhaps it is because it would not be the same following Frodo and Sam slogging toward Mordor, or the Battle of Helm’s Deep in the bright sunlight with birds chirping and flowers blooming. Some things are better enjoyed when the world is well into what Ray Bradbury called The October Country.

I’ve got plenty of books “in progress,” so to speak. One is about the American Revolution, and another is a collection of ancient Chinese myths. Still a third is about the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and I keep starting another about the early British journeys into Africa. But I have set them all aside for my yearly sojourn through Middle Earth. I’ve been reading the trilogy since my childhood. The books are the ones I have had since I was a boy, with the foldout maps at the end. I got them in the '70s, and the covers are starting to fall off. I am not discovering anything new in the pages; there are no “aha” or “I never noticed that before” moments; it is more like a reunion with old friends. I am more than happy to set off with Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli to traverse now very familiar ground to rescue Merry and Pippin from the Orcs. Of course, I know how it all ends; that’s not the point. The point is, I am in Middle Earth for a few precious hours a day. I know the route from the Shire through the Old Forest to Bree, and through Moria and Lothlorien, all the way to Minas Tirith and the Cracks of Doom. 

I’m not one to attend conventions wearing fake ears and pretend swords. I cannot speak or write Elvish, and I don’t head into the woods for a weekend of fantasy LARPing. I gave World of Warcraft an honest try, but could never quite get into it. If I were ever in a Tolkien trivia contest, I would be thoroughly trounced and shamed out of the room. Be that as it may, Middle Earth has become well-known territory to me, and its inhabitants are as familiar to me as my dogs. If I missed my yearly visit, I would be out of sorts until the following autumn.

Something is soul-healing about reading good fiction, or even mediocre fiction that is at least entertaining. I sift through plenty of real-life horror stories for PJ Media, and chances are, you read the same news I do; at some point, enough is enough.

Recently, I was permitted to run amok at a used book sale. Mrs. Brown, God bless her, slipped the collected works of H.P. Lovecraft into my ever-growing stack. Entire essays can and have been written about Lovecraft, including his work, upbringing, oddities, and his xenophobia and racism. I even tried my hand at it once. Lovecraft’s works are entertaining and imaginative, but often predictable and formulaic. The darkness is always “stygian,” everything is “eldritch,” and the action usually takes place under a “gibbous moon.” Be that as it may, I thoroughly enjoy his work for its outlandish weirdness. One can lose oneself amongst the moldy tombs and non-Euclidean geometry, populated by ghouls and tentacled alien horrors, and actually relax. Of course, if one lives in, say, Portland, Lovecraft’s stories may read more like the local news. 

It is important to be well-informed and educated so that you may debate your adversaries, interpret the news of the day, vote wisely, and all of those things. It is equally important to give your mind a vacation so that it can handle the news feed without driving you to madness. It is vital to be present, and it is equally vital to get lost now and then. 

With that in mind, I shall take my leave of you for the rest of the week to embark on a long-overdue and much-needed vacation. And yes, I am headed up to my stacks to find something entertaining but not too absorbing for the next week.

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