must choose, choose wisely
truth will bring you life, the lie …
will take it from you
The reoccurring theme of late in my haiku are thoughts from the book Shoeless Joe by WP Kinsella.
I am reconnecting with the book this summer as I am listening to it during my commute to and from work.
Years and years ago I found myself in Toronto at what was billed as the World’s Biggest Bookstore and there was nothing about the bookstore that gave you any reason to dispute the claim.
As I remember it, it filled an entire block of downtown Toronto and was 4 stories high and filled with books.
Overwhelmed as I am whenever I get in a bookstore like that as I want them all, I selected one of those Penguin volumes of the BEST CANADIAN SHORT STORIES for whatever year it was, as an appropriate souvenir and that was when I first read the short story, Shoeless Joe Comes to Iowa.
This was before Mr. Kinsella developed the theme into a book and the story ends with Shoeless Joe asking Ray if he can comeback and bring his friends.
Ray says yes and mentions a catcher he was familiar with he asks Joe if he can come back too.
Joe promises that if he and friends can back, they will look at the catcher.
And that’s where it ends.
You cannot read Shoeless Joe and not think of the movie Field of Dreams.
Most of the time, I think of parts in the book (the twin brother, the James Earl Jones character is JD Salinger, The oldest living Chicago Cub) that don’t make it into the movie.
But today I was thinking of a part of the movie that isn’t in the book.
The scene where Ray and Annie go to school meeting about banning a book.
Had the movie kept JD Salinger, the meeting would have been about a school board banning The Catcher in the Rye.
But JD Salinger isn’t in the movie.
And the scene, as marvelous as it is, is not in the book.
I was thinking about that scene in the movie though.
I was thinking about people watching that scene back when the movie was released in 1989.
I was thinking, were there people in the audience who sided with the lady who called for the book to be banned?
Was there anyone in the audience who, back in those innocent days before 9/11, twitter, cell phones, covid and Fox News who felt anything but that ‘could this ever happen in America again?’
TODAY, I still feel can there be people who watch this scene and not get excited and not say about Annie, that’s who I want to be?
But there are.
I have some of the same feelings about the movie, To Kill a Mockingbird.
How can people watch this movie and not get excited and say about Atticus Finch, that is who I want to be?
But there are.
I hope, if you asked them, do you want to be the nazi book banner or do you want to be Bob E. Lee Ewell, they would say, of course not.
But that’s who they line up with.
There is a choice to be made.
I am reminded of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
I enjoyed the movie.
There was so much promise that fell oh so short, but not the worst movie in the world.
I am reminded of the movie and scene where they get to the room with the holy grail.
Filled with holy grails.
And the old Knight says, ‘You must choose. But choose wisely, as the true grail will bring you life, and the false grail will take it from you.‘
Of course the bad man gets the wrong grail and turns to dust before your eyes.
The old Knight watches and then says, slowly, He chose poorly.
Here is the scene from the Field of Dreams.
No Haiku For You 