Mr. Blue Sky

I just spent the last few hours in Hyde Park sitting under this balmy blanket of blue, reading and writing and watching shirtless joggers trot by.

Nice work if you can get it.

I found myself in the middle of an eccentric family, all warm-hearted and quirky and just trying to understand their own worlds. Wondering why Morgan Gower can be a doctor one day and a shoe-repair clerk the next, just blending in to whatever character he decides to inhabit. He’s so different from me, who overanalyzes much too often and worries about people thinking I might be a fraud.

But then again, he's a character ... can fictional characters be role models? Some might say no. But those are probably people who never wished Atticus Finch was their dad.

Ah, the things you ponder when reading an Anne Tyler novel. Funny, I never had those thoughts last week when reading about necrophiliac serial killers. Maybe that's the distinction between fiction and literature. One you plow through on a plane, one you savor in the park.