trailhands

Now on my “current reading” bookshelf is Larry McMurtry’s 1985 oeuvre Lonesome Dove. Even halfway through, it seems odd that I’m reading it. On the surface, it seems somewhat outside my normal scope. Yet, this is something I’ve intended to get to for some time.

A college friend expressed more than once her favorite movie was the Lonesome Dove miniseries. I have small snippets in my memory from this movie, mainly involving a tumbling ball of snakes which may or may not occur in the movie. Whenever she had occasion to say this, I looked at her quizzically not comprehending how this story fit in with the rest of her character. But according to a Wikipedia article, “The mini-series is considered by many to be one of the finest westerns ever made.”

When I hear the word ‘western’ or even the name Larry McMurtry, I am immediately reminded of my grandfather who could often be found snoozing in front of the TV while someone organized a posse or conducted a hanging or managed to get a herd of cattle across a river. Despite the requisite fascination with the movies “Shane” and “Old Yeller” in middle school, my general impression has been that westerns are a boring lot; definite snooze territory.

So, I had practically discarded the entire genre as not worth my time. When I discovered McMurtry’s novel had won the Pulitzer Prize, my elitist nature took over and it found a place on my reading list. There was some additional motivation, again a hook to my youth. My father also enjoys such things, and reading this book is in an odd way like helping him in the woodshop or under the hood of the car. Probably better for you to trust me on that than for me to botch the sentiment in awkward explanation.

One thing I want those of you who remain skeptical to know is that this book is funny. It’s neither comical which implies a certain contrived nature, nor is it designed to be joking. It is simply a compelling sketch of believable men moving through the events of the story. The humor is often subtle, and coaxes the reader into the background of the statement and taking the side of wit.

For the past few days lunch has allowed an opportunity to withdraw from a world of 21st Century technology and business infrastructure. Instead, I am immured in a land 130 years distant, which causes the sixty minutes I have to seem much longer.