Ironically enough

A couple of years back, because Alanis Morissette
wrote and recorded a song called "Ironic", the lyrics of which were pretty much free of irony, there ensued a discussion in academic circles about what irony really is. Irony is best illustrated in stories such as O. Henry's "Gift of the Magi," in which the guy sells his watch to buy pretty combs for his wife's hair, and she sells her hair to buy him a watch fob. (Such failures in planning by married folks have been a constant in network sitcoms dating back as far as Ozzie and Harriet.) It would have been amusingly ironic had the publisher of the Magi story paid the writer with a check made out to O. Henry, because that was only his nom de plume (French for "to each his own"), having been born Wm. Sidney Porter. Try cashing that check, and the teller's going "Yeah right, 'O' ! Your ID says Porter and you want to cash a check made out to Mr Henry?"

Rain on your wedding day, lighting a smoke in a no-smoke zone, having a plethora of spoons when all you want is one knife: these are not ironies, but coincidences or mockeries of what should have been, had things worked out. Although, ironically, you're better off not smoking...

Lovers of the ironic have long noted with a shake of the head that Keith Richards, the man whose dissolute lifestyle has regularly astounded even his debauched and libertine friends, is as of this writing (and I just checked CNN.com and the Comcast home page, just to be sure!) completely alive, and, as you see here, the very picture of health and refined living.


On the other foot, Jim Fixx passed away after running, and he was well known for extolling the health benefits of running. It's not known if Keith Richards ever read Fixx's books, being busy as he often was having his blood drained and changed to overcome the toxicity of opiate abuse.

Whatever, à chacun son goût,(pen name, as they say it in sunny France.) It's his life, and until the day he "rings me up" on the "telly" and inquires as to my wellbeing, it's none of my concern.

But this is irony: Dave Freeman died the other day way too young, at the age of 47. That is way too young to fall down and hit one's head and die from it for anyone, but for the guy who wrote 100 Things To Do Before You Die, it has to mean that he left things undone. Reading his book just made it onto my list of things I want to do before I head up to that big express checkout, as is making my own list of 100 things I want to do. I've been planning to write a list of the 100 songs I would load onto my desert island mp3 player, because my friend Jonie asked me to, and the list is ready! I will blog about it. Trust me, there are no esoteric, rare cuts on the list...I just pointed a finger at the clipboard and it came to rest on "Suspicious Minds" by Elvis A. Presley...but it does list the songs I can listen to over and over. Ironically, none of them are by Alanis Morissette.