Dog Earring Days Are Over --I know stupid title
"Dog earring pages gave me a grip; I could introduce the first parts of the book to myself, and never have to fall out of love with them if the ending spoiled everything. I could press down all the corner parts of the pages I wanted, never having to unveil the uncertainty that is the end. However, I would wait and wait and wait, and never muster the courage to finish, because with the fear of imperfection stamped on my forehead like a like a permanent birthmark would insure me that waiting was better.
Last year, determined to see a movie based on a book with my friends, I had to finish. I looked at the cover of the book every day, pondering the fate of the main character. One morning in the library before chorus, I sunk my headphones into my ears and my iPod died instantly--as if it were all in slow motion--someone blurted out the ending of the novel across the table, and doomed by fate I could no longer procrastinate.
That uncertainty of the character's fate, kept the book alive, I could hold on to the storylines of the characters, make up a million endings in my head, until the absolute truth was revealed. But just as I met my fate so did the characters in the book and things did not happen as I expected. No matter how many endings I had dreamed up, those forty something pages I have left will always be there, it's just a matter of me reading it or not."
There isn't really a 'moral' to this story. But as of now I just tell the books, 'I don't know how to carry on' as charlyne yi sings in one of my favorite songs...So what am I reading or really not reading?
i. Lit by Mary Karr on page 240--pretty much the most enthralling and close to my gene makeup memoir ever which even though is about a straight white female things I do not identify with Mary Karr is on my list of heroes, she tells this story through a lens of her present self talking to her younger self by retelling a story about her life to her son Dev, I read more memoirs than I can count but particularly this one has shaken me up so much that I think finishing it will be exploding bubbles from a forgotten --shaken up-- sprite that handles my thirst by raging itself stickily all over my hard wood floors--in short, please read this if you've ever known a writer, ever wanted to be, or ever had a family member or friend who was an alcoholic.
ii. Just Kids by Patti Smith (I know I know, leave me alone I can't see this masterpiece end, I mean it took me holding on to it for about 5 months before I got past the first couple pages) on page 246--I know Patti would be wagging her index finger my direction and maybe it's not such a bad thing to not want this book to be over, and yes, I know she has a somewhat sequel coming out in October. But what sort of sequel in the history of them, quenched the thirst you developed after ending the first part? I'm not sure when I'll say goodbye to Just Kids, but hopefully soon, because I'm crying not being able to know the last 40 pages and what they hold.
iii. NAIVE. SUPER by Erlend Loe --found this book on a list of books that sum up depression without the "Louise Hay Method" aka "You are important, and belong here" "This is your day" crap, I sound pretentious saying I don't agree with that kind of pseduo-self help but it's just too real, too honest, and apparently this book was not. It has a lot of lists which I enjoy, but the main reason I stopped reading it was my PoC conscience was like, "Excuse me, you are gonna read a book about a straight white middle class man?..Instead of Audre Lorde's book that is ungratefully collecting dust over it's bright orange cover??" and whenever that guilt wears off I will jump back in, but you see it fails to, because I keep picking up books by white authors, and I keep hating myself for it.
iv. Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto---page 40 or so and it's so brash and truthful that reading it pierces a part of me that's afraid so of course to protect my ego I stopped reading the pink soft cover
v. The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls--not sure what page but getting to the end of childhood and the beginning of some back breaking paragraphs that I can't mend by my fingertips trying so hard not to turn to the next leaflet of a page.
vi. All of three Zadie Smith books: NW, White Teeth, and On Beauty. So there, all dead poc authors can send me bad omens and curses now.
vii. more books novels by milan kundera and toni morrison and franx fanon and agatha christie included
to put it plainly, finishing is grief. I start on page one and in my hands unfolding are lives, polished in names I have never known by memory, and hands I won't see across from mine waving to me, or even the jeans that this person wears every other day that only familiars recognize this pattern. I don’t want to shut the book and move on from that life, the mundane stories about their day asked routinely over dinner, the time they cut their hair and almost cried, the paper cut they ask you to inspect--the clasp of a necklace behind their back. It hurts that I can’t live those moments along the author or the characters, so I can’t leave the book; to start at the beginning and to finish at the end.
maybe not finishing is "all in [my] mind,"
cbnl
p.s. it's so cold in alaska
"Dog earring pages gave me a grip; I could introduce the first parts of the book to myself, and never have to fall out of love with them if the ending spoiled everything. I could press down all the corner parts of the pages I wanted, never having to unveil the uncertainty that is the end. However, I would wait and wait and wait, and never muster the courage to finish, because with the fear of imperfection stamped on my forehead like a like a permanent birthmark would insure me that waiting was better.
Last year, determined to see a movie based on a book with my friends, I had to finish. I looked at the cover of the book every day, pondering the fate of the main character. One morning in the library before chorus, I sunk my headphones into my ears and my iPod died instantly--as if it were all in slow motion--someone blurted out the ending of the novel across the table, and doomed by fate I could no longer procrastinate.
That uncertainty of the character's fate, kept the book alive, I could hold on to the storylines of the characters, make up a million endings in my head, until the absolute truth was revealed. But just as I met my fate so did the characters in the book and things did not happen as I expected. No matter how many endings I had dreamed up, those forty something pages I have left will always be there, it's just a matter of me reading it or not."
There isn't really a 'moral' to this story. But as of now I just tell the books, 'I don't know how to carry on' as charlyne yi sings in one of my favorite songs...So what am I reading or really not reading?
i. Lit by Mary Karr on page 240--pretty much the most enthralling and close to my gene makeup memoir ever which even though is about a straight white female things I do not identify with Mary Karr is on my list of heroes, she tells this story through a lens of her present self talking to her younger self by retelling a story about her life to her son Dev, I read more memoirs than I can count but particularly this one has shaken me up so much that I think finishing it will be exploding bubbles from a forgotten --shaken up-- sprite that handles my thirst by raging itself stickily all over my hard wood floors--in short, please read this if you've ever known a writer, ever wanted to be, or ever had a family member or friend who was an alcoholic.
ii. Just Kids by Patti Smith (I know I know, leave me alone I can't see this masterpiece end, I mean it took me holding on to it for about 5 months before I got past the first couple pages) on page 246--I know Patti would be wagging her index finger my direction and maybe it's not such a bad thing to not want this book to be over, and yes, I know she has a somewhat sequel coming out in October. But what sort of sequel in the history of them, quenched the thirst you developed after ending the first part? I'm not sure when I'll say goodbye to Just Kids, but hopefully soon, because I'm crying not being able to know the last 40 pages and what they hold.
iii. NAIVE. SUPER by Erlend Loe --found this book on a list of books that sum up depression without the "Louise Hay Method" aka "You are important, and belong here" "This is your day" crap, I sound pretentious saying I don't agree with that kind of pseduo-self help but it's just too real, too honest, and apparently this book was not. It has a lot of lists which I enjoy, but the main reason I stopped reading it was my PoC conscience was like, "Excuse me, you are gonna read a book about a straight white middle class man?..Instead of Audre Lorde's book that is ungratefully collecting dust over it's bright orange cover??" and whenever that guilt wears off I will jump back in, but you see it fails to, because I keep picking up books by white authors, and I keep hating myself for it.
iv. Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto---page 40 or so and it's so brash and truthful that reading it pierces a part of me that's afraid so of course to protect my ego I stopped reading the pink soft cover
v. The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls--not sure what page but getting to the end of childhood and the beginning of some back breaking paragraphs that I can't mend by my fingertips trying so hard not to turn to the next leaflet of a page.
vi. All of three Zadie Smith books: NW, White Teeth, and On Beauty. So there, all dead poc authors can send me bad omens and curses now.
vii. more books novels by milan kundera and toni morrison and franx fanon and agatha christie included
to put it plainly, finishing is grief. I start on page one and in my hands unfolding are lives, polished in names I have never known by memory, and hands I won't see across from mine waving to me, or even the jeans that this person wears every other day that only familiars recognize this pattern. I don’t want to shut the book and move on from that life, the mundane stories about their day asked routinely over dinner, the time they cut their hair and almost cried, the paper cut they ask you to inspect--the clasp of a necklace behind their back. It hurts that I can’t live those moments along the author or the characters, so I can’t leave the book; to start at the beginning and to finish at the end.
maybe not finishing is "all in [my] mind,"
cbnl
p.s. it's so cold in alaska
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