Novelty

I am easily bored. My mind is constantly searching for stimulation, often in the form of information and ideas. It is very difficult for me to just be. The easily bored find strange ways to fill time. I am known for reading the ingredient labels on restaurant condiments. One of the reasons I enjoy southern California more than my former home of Illinois is the wide variety of hot sauce bottles provided for my reading pleasure. In the Midwest everything is ketchup.
This drive for the novel is far removed from the adrenaline junky lifestyle of my MTV infected brethren. I am in many respects a sedentary person. Well, not so much sedentary as predictable. My idea of an action-packed evening is going to a cafe and actually talking to people instead of reading. The conflict is between the draw of the new and my easily over stimulated brain. My existence is defined by quick bursts of more, more, more and long periods of rest.
So I seek out brief times of solitude. In particular I enjoy the sight of blank billboards. There is something about blank spaces in the modern world that gives me chills. There are so few sacred spaces in the United States. Every inch is for sale.
Billboards are purposely designed to replace the beauty of the open sky with an image of the SUV that just passed me in the fast lane. If only some rich benefactor (or a monkeywrenching group) would cover all the billboards with pastel colors. After a month of passing only pleasingly colored rectangles in the sky we may again realize how gaudy and crass our cities have become.

I realize that not everyone is as easily over stimulated as I am. Still, something really needs to change.