Deck

Do you find that when you are reading a book, you start to think and behave like a character in the book? Sort of like leaving a horror movie and sleeping with the light on, although it lasts for days.

The book I'm reading is Richard Russo's Bridge of Sighs. It's a terrific and complicated novel, but in its essence, it's about a few 60-year-olds who are working to understand how the events of their childhoods have led them to the place they are. Which means I am caught in a web of introspective nostalgia and self-reflection. My favorite place.

It's fun to watch several episodes of The Sopranos and then going to teach a class. Fun for me, anyway, but I don't know about my students. Watching Seinfeld and The Simpsons create no problems, because they fit how my normal self behaves. Kurt Vonnegut novels are in the same vein, only more caustic. Thus, I amuse myself more but upset others more frequently.

Music is this way, too, although I've always been suspicious of the ability of a certain combination of chords or notes or whatever to make you happy or sad or whatever. Was there a Batman villain who was able to use this to commit crime? Regardless, I am wary whenever Jonah plays something on his guitar and then asks for something. I fear I'm prone to musical hypnosis.