Claudius: …With fiery quickness: therefore prepare thyself; The bark is ready, and the wind at help, The associates tend, and everything is bent For England. Hamlet: For England! Claudius: Ay, Hamlet. Hamlet: Good.
Hamlet, Act IV, Scene 3
That is how this draft began as I prepared for vacation in London. I left before I’d written any more. I was unplugged the whole time I was there (a state that almost constitutes a vacation in itself) and took a paper notebook with me: I wrote less than a page while in the airport.
In the scene above Hamlet says “Good” which I’d never really noticed before despite having read, seen and heard the play more times than I can count. I guess I always skated over it as a sort of bland acknowledgment of what Claudius had said. As I did things preparing for the trip the phrase “everything is bent for England” kept rolling around in my head. When I looked it up, I found that “Good”. I, too, found it good.
I went to The Globe while there, did the tour (a little too late in the season to catch a play). I’d like to write a bit about the trip before I forget it all, but having gotten past jet-lag I now am experiencing “life-lag”. There’s a wonderful sense of freedom when you just step out of your life, go elsewhere, be unplugged, live with a different daily rhythm. Then there’s the daily rhythm thrumming when you get home and the whole trip takes on a dream-like quality as you look at your Inbox and try to get hold of everything that you let hang fire.
I should be diligently doing things-that-must-be-done right now—and I did do some things this morning—but I’d rather plug myself into the social networks, talk to friends, sort through my pictures and video and finish this blog post I began before I left. Just to let you know that I’ve been “there and back again” and to tell you that the world won’t end if you step out of your life for a little while. When I step out of my life for a little while then step back in again, it’s a different life I step back into because I’m a different person. My world is brighter, fresher and more enjoyable for my excursion elsewhere. Come to think of it, it’s sort like the effect of reading a good novel. Vacations and books have a natural affinity to each other.
I suppose at this point I should mention that while I was gone my first three ebooks made their way into more online stores. They’re in Barnes & Noble’s store now, as well as Amazon and Smashwords. Still waiting on Borders, but the first two are in the Kobo store, so Borders should be next. They should be in the iBookstore for iPad. Later I’m going to the mall and will browse around with an iPad and see if I can find them there.
Now I’m going to make a pot of tea and enjoy the autumn afternoon.
