Confession time: I have never read Alice in Wonderland. All I know about it comes from the Disney movie, which I realize may be nothing like the book. Plus, I’ve heard or read various people talking about “rabbit trails” in connection with it. My memory of the movie is hazy, as it’s been a long time since I saw it. I guess Alice follows a rabbit trail which takes her off her intended course. That’s the best I understand it, and what I mean by the title of this post: following things that take you off course.

For the last month, maybe a little longer, I have allowed my writing focus to be diverted to two projects related to Thomas Carlyle. I’ve written about them before here. One is a comprehensive bibliography of his compositions, in chronological order. The other is a book about his book Chartism, and the literary reception it has had in the 175 years since it was published. Both of these are books that are in progress. I have computer files of both.

While the Chartism book is fairly far along, most of my recent efforts have gone into the Bibliography. It’s something I enjoy working on, something that is different than other bibliographies of his works. However, I’m learning just what an incredible rabbit hole it is.

On my noon hour I did some searching for copies of some research papers on Carlyle, from the last 25 to 30 years, which I believe will have various Carlyle compositions that were never documented, which I would like to add to my Bibliography. As I expected, these volumes are under copyright and not available on-line. I didn’t check to see where they are in any of the world’s libraries, though I’m sure they are somewhere. Also, I could possibly buy some back issues of them.

Then, I did some looking into something at the Carlyle Letters Online, the Duke University site that is a goldmine for Carlyle researchers. In five minutes of research I found reference made to two compositions that I don’t remember knowing about or seeing in any bibliography (though possibly they are there under a different title).

And, I came to the realization of the madness of it all.

I don’t have time for this. It’s something maybe 20 or 30 people in the world are interested in. Why would I write books like these? I’ve been sinking a lot of time into this lately, even after saying I was going to “button up” current research and lay it aside. I thought I did that a week ago, yet, here I am, still at it.

Last night, before getting on my Carlyle research, I proofed my Federal income taxes, found them to be correct, and stuck them in a folder to take them to work to make copies of. Except when I checked that folder this afternoon they weren’t there. What did I do with them? Then there’s Daddy-Daughter Day, sitting there with a finished cover, finished formatted book, waiting for me to take an hour to upload them to CreateSpace and order a proof copy to see if it’s truly ready to go. Did I do that last night? No, after taxes I worked on Carlyle. Madness! Sheer madness!

So, this time I’m for sure ending this. All my work is saved; copies of some things are printed for putting in a notebook. Tonight I’ll put them in the notebook. Then I’m going to find Ginny Weasley and ask her to hide the notebook (actually two notebooks, or maybe three) in the Room of Requirement, somewhere I won’t find them. Tonight, when I get home after Good Friday service, after eating supper and descending to The Dungeon, I will do the work needed on Daddy-Daughter Day. Carlyle can watch me, if he wants to, and complain that I’m ignoring the Sage of Chelsea. Let him complain. For the foreseeable future I’m done with him.