There is never enough time for stuff. And by “Stuff” I mean books, comics, TV, movies, video games, and whatever other entertainment thing that is at my disposal. There is a lot of it in this day and age. Way more than there is time. But it turns out that sometimes I like the idea of entertainment rather than the entertainment itself. First off I like to make things: drawings, paintings, photos, and other such creative endeavors. I like to make things more than most people so maybe I’m not typical but I often have more things to entertain me than I have time for. Or that I make time for. Writing this blog takes a bit of time and right now I’d rather blog than watch TV or some such but that doesn’t stop me from having a bunch of TV shows recorded and lined up to be watched when I have the time. If I ever have the time.
Books are the easiest thing to pile up since they take the longest amount of time to get through. Since I bought my iPad last year and put the Kindle app on it I’ve bought a lot of dollar books. So far I’ve only read about one in five of the books I’ve purchased but they were only a dollar. Who cares if I never read them? At least I have them there waiting to be read. That’s my concept for today. There can be entertainment value or at least some satisfaction in anticipating entertainment that never actually happens.
It reminds me of a discussion that was had in some long ago college class of mine. I no longer have any idea which class it even was but the discussion was about materialism. The teacher’s point that he (or she I really don’t remember) was trying to make to us undergrads was that human beings who were thought to be materialistic really weren’t. People like money even more than material things. Most people will take the cash value of the thing over the thing. People like the idea of being able to buy any material thing they want over the actual material thing. The idea of being a millionaire was liked because of all the things you could buy but the things weren’t as important as the ability to get them. The teacher even had a word for that concept but alas I have long forgotten it. At least I haven’t forgotten the concept itself. That stuck with me.
There is no word for my concept yet. The fun to be found in anticipating entertainment rather then the entertainment itself has not yet been named. Sometimes I even put specific things off. I’ve finally put a halt to my buying of a lot of comic book hardcover collections. I’ve picked up quite a lot of them over that last three years or so. Mostly I’ve been buying them because there is so much good stuff available for the first time in large hardcover books. Comics that I never thought in a million years would be reprinted let alone in an archival format have been released over the last half decade or so. It’s a golden age of comic book and comic strip reprints. How could I not get as many old favorites as I could?
One of the books I specifically haven’t read is Jack Kirby’s “The Demon”. I’ve bought a lot of 1970’s Jack Kirby in this collected form. That’s my favorite time period for Kirby’s work so that makes them some of my favorite comics. I’ve read just about all of his comics from then except for “The Demon”. The book has been sitting on my shelf, unread, for a couple of years now. After I finally read it I’ll have no new 1970s Kirby to read. That’s the only reason I haven’t read it yet. I enjoy looking forward to reading it but it’s the last 1070s Kirby that I can look forward to reading for the first time. What’s the word for that? I don’t know.
I knew that it would take me a while to get around to reading a lot of the hardcover comic collections I bought over the last few years but I bought them anyway. I wanted to own them. I guess that’s materialism but I also want to be able to read them someday rather than just own them. My threshold for getting rid of a particular comic is asking myself, “Are you ever going to read this again?”. If I answer that question with a “No” than I get rid of the comic. Why should I have it hanging around just taking up space? Get rid of it. Make room for new stuff. So that’s how I know that I want to read these new books. Otherwise I wouldn’t have purchased them. But do I really want to read them or do I want to look forward to reading them? That is the question I pose to the universe today.
I’ve known people who put off watching the last season of some favorite TV show of theirs. I’ve never done this myself but they didn’t want to finish watching the series right away. They knew there were no more new shows of it so they didn’t want to use up the last of the shows that were new to them. The same concept of enjoying the anticipation of entertainment in a different medium.
I also have a bunch of TV shows recorded and in queue. But will I ever watch them? There are a few series that I’ve wanted to watch. Let’s take “Leverage” and “Justified” for example. I’ve heard and read good things about those two shows. I’ve wanted to check them out. I’ve recorded them for the past year. Still, I haven’t bothered to watch them. I already have things I like to watch so when am I supposed to find time to watch new things? Now we’re back to “Not enough time for or interest in entertainment”. That’s different from my “Anticipating entertainment” concept but I wonder if they’re related. After all it doesn’t take a lot of time to enjoy having a pile of new entertainment. Much less time than it takes to watch or read the stuff. Oh well, back to work. I have to finish up a drawing.
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