the glory days are returning...

All that is gold does not glitter,
not all those who wander are lost;
the old that is strong does not wither,
deep roots are not reached by the frost.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
a light from the shadows shall spring;
renenwed shall be blade that was broken,
the crownless again shall be king.

—J.R.R. Tolkien

Remember those three glorious Christmas seasons, when on one beautiful day, a week or two before the holiday you stood in line at a movie theater for a ridiculously long period of time, after getting there earlier that day to actually purchase tickets for yourself and ten or twenty of your closest friends, to ensure that the moment you had been waiting for, in some cases for about 365 days, was actually going to happen?

I do. Those three years when the December release date rolled around and the new Lord Of The Rings movie finally arrived in our eager and expectant lives were glorious, and even to this day, every time I turn the November page on the calendar, I feel a pang of sadness that those glory days are over.

It's not to say that I don't still enjoy the movies. Since the movies were released on DVD, I have spent more than a few weekends with one foot firmly planted in Middle Earth. But there is something special about the first time you see a movie, even if you've already read the book. The mystery of seeing someone else's vision of what you've both read brought to life, how it compares to your own, and takes on a life of its own is a beautiful thing. Regrettably, you can only see something for the first time once. Unless, of course, you can arrange for a bout of amnesia, which, having never attempted it, I probably wouldn't recommend.

So, before you actually begin to consider self-induced amnesia, let me make your day by telling you that in 610 days, on December 19, 2012, the glory is returning...



If you haven't yet read The Hobbit, don't worry, you've got a bit of time.