Mood:
caffeinatedTopic: "Chariots' a' Comin'"(4)
Baseball is a lot like life itself, or at least that is the way it seems to Frodo. "You can be coasting along on a two-run lead and the losing team hasn't even threatened," he said "and then all of a sudden the shortstop makes an error on a routine ground ball and you give up seven runs." Such, Frodo supposes, is the situation as he wrestles Gollum for possession of the Ring, near the very end of his long and difficult journey through Mordor and into the inner caverns of Mount Doom. To be so close to victory over Sauron, and to find danger in every direction has kept Frodo intense, if not morose. It is difficult to write, dear reader, when all you experience is bad.
In another week Frodo will journey to the College of the Shire, there to join with Hobbits from dispersed points throughout Middle Earth who return, perhaps for a final time, to the spot where they spawned themselves into alumni, forty years ago. Frankly, Frodo doubted that his life would last for forty years, since there were many guns pointed in his direction in those days.
It is an oxymoron to refer to any as the most hideous of wars, but if there were ever a true candidate for such a title, it would be that which took place in the steaming jungles of Southeast Asia. Despite the unspeakable stupidity of a pre-emptive war, or the "Bush Doctrine" so dubbed by Charles Gibson, and the subsequent economic and diplomatic morass produced by a moronic President, Frodo can't let go of the losses he experienced in those days, so long ago. It was not until Barack Obama wrote so eloquently about the need for our nation to step beyond the internal conflict raging in so many of our hearts that Frodo recognized his obsession.
In less than a month the enemy will be confronted on the final battlefield. Two months later the light in Sauron's Tower will be extinguished, and then the Hobbits return to the challenges of life in the Shire. There is no money, there is no work, and sometimes there isn't even any rain. It will not be easy, but perhaps there will be laughter, and Frodo will feel like telling stories, once again.
In the interim, perhaps he will be confronted by an old girl friend, alone, in the corner, in the dark.
