Imagine this: you are ten years old. Your family is very religious and you live right in the middle of the Bible belt. Every Sunday you're taken to a Pentacostal church where you see people rolling around on the floor, shaking like madmen and speaking in tongues. You're told that you're nothing but a sinner and that unless you live absolutely according to God's unknowable plan, you're going to Hell.
That was me. And I was scared shitless.
Why? Because I wasn't even sure if I believed that God existed or not.
I tried talking to my parents. My mother cried and my father told me to talk to my grandfather. My grandfather told me to talk to the youth pastor. The youth pastor told me to talk to the head pastor. So, I did.
Looking back, maybe I could have started with something other than, 'If God created everything, who created God?' But, I was ten. What did I know? He told me that I was a blasphemer and that I would end up in Hell if I continued asking questions like that. As far as he and my family were concerned, that was the end of that.
(more below the fold, wherein I stop sounding like I'm bashing religion.)
That summer, my family went on vacation to Atlanta, GA, which is about a six hour trip. My younger sister and I ran out of ways to entertain ourselves about one hour in. We quickly began to drive our parents crazy with our arguing and torturing each other, so they stopped the minivan at a mall to try to find some toys or games or oh my God, something to occupy us.
The original copy that I bought 25 years ago.
Walking by the B. Dalton store, I saw a little blue book with a wacky cover: a green, no-eyed smiley face sticking its tongue out and waving its hands over a big hitchhiking thumb, all on a field of stars and planets.
'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'? I thought. 'That's a funny name and it's got a funny cover. Douglas Adams? Never heard of him. I want it.' (This may be an exaggeration. I don't think I sounded like a detective in a noir film at ten, but who can really say?)
At this point, I should mention that my father doesn't read. It's not that he can't read. He just doesn't. No books, no magazines, not even newspapers. Therefore, I didn't read either. But, for whatever reason, something about this one book just spoke to my eager little mind.
So, I picked it up and talked my father into buying it for me. By that, I mean I stomped around the B. Dalton store, saying, 'I want this I want this I want this' until he finally said, 'OK! But this is four dollars. You had better read it.'
And, oh, how I read it. It begins with the following paragraphs:
"Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.
Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea."
And there, in those first three pages, I knew that this book was IMPORTANT. It questioned the existence of God. It questioned why people were so unhappy all the time. It questioned evolution. It questioned how neat of an idea digital watches are.
So, I read the book cover to cover then flipped back to the beginning and read it all over again, from Arthur Dent's muddy protest against Mr. Prosser's bulldozer to Ford Prefect's nonchalant attitude about the destruction of Earth to Deep Thought’s Answer to The Great Question (forty-two, by the way). I writhed in pain during Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz's 'poetry'. I tasted the Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster. I fell in love with Trillian and her 'mice'. I wanted to be Zaphod Beeblebrox, two-head President of the Galaxy, and steal The Heart of Gold for no reason other than that I could get away with it.
And Marvin. Poor, poor Marvin. I know you would never believe me, but you were always my favorite. Who but the most paranoid of androids could talk a sentient spaceship into committing suicide?
In fact, that's what I remember most about that trip to Atlanta: it was really hot and I read 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'. Twice. When we got home, I read everything I could get my hands on. Fiction, non-fiction, history, science; it didn’t matter, as long as it had words in it. I still do.
No, reading 'The Hitchhiker's Guide' didn't teach me the secret to life, the universe, and everything. It didn't teach me why people are so unhappy so much of the time, even if they do have digital watches. And I still don't know if God exists or not.
Instead, that book taught me so much more. It gave me a life-long love for the written word. It taught me to always question things and more interesting ways in which to do so. It showed me that I’m not the only one who doesn’t know why we are floating on this insignificant little blue-green planet. It showed me that everyone is different and that it's okay if you don't want to blindly follow tradition for the sake of tradition. But most importantly, it taught me that having a sense of humor is the most important thing in the universe. Well, that, and a clean towel.
UPDATE: this was technically my 'first diary' and you guys put it on the rec list? thank you all!