Andrey Labunets

David Foster Wallace on the importance of quiet (and reading)

When I was in highschool, a friend gave me a copy of "On The Road." It was a big part of what inspired me to wander into a freight train yard and climb on a 48 for the first time, or to stand by an on-ramp and stick my thumb out for a string of rides across the country a few years later. I remember reading it and wanting my life to feel as full, to have friendships as meaningful, to know so much more about what was "out there." On those trips I was always wide-eyed, writing poetry, talking to everybody, leaning forward into the road ahead. I'm in a re-reading phase, and I tried re-reading "On The Road" for the first time since I was a teenager. I actually couldn't finish it. Far from being inspiring, all I could think was that I'm glad that isn't my life. It seemed almost the inverse of everything that inspired me as a teenager: shallow relationships, absent of meaning, a small and almost unadventurous existence. This has been the same for almost everything I've re-read. It has made me realize that if I re-read something and am not disappointed, it probably means I've been doing something wrong.