An excerpt and an idol and a reason why I write.

I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.

-The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, chapter 7

I have tried to describe this feeling on countless occasions, but was never quite able to in the way that she does. I could try to tell little aspects- the world rushing by me or missing every opportunity I watch come along or wanting and wanting and wanting so badly that I feel like it physically hurts. But alone, I think, none of these suffice. Now that I've read how she says it, I can almost explain what it is for me- wanting an English degree from Merton college at Oxford, but still needing to studying theatre at NYU or Yale, I want to live in a small apartment with a balcony in Montmatre Paris, or a little cottage in the English countryside and feel incredibly chiche and romantic, but also, I'd love to stay in New York. I want a little girl who looks like me, but I swear I'll never settle. I want to be a runner and a writer and a performer and a free spirit and someone grounded and to be this person and that person, but then I want just a better version of myself. I feel my life unraveling before me, every step defining the next one, every choice leading to something larger, feeling that I must make these decisions fast before time runs out, but never being able to. I know that logically I cannot have all of this- be in two places at once, be five different people at once, have ten different lives at once- but illogically I think I'll never be happy without it, and unable to bring myself to a choice, I eventually see it slipping away, smell the figs of what could have been my future rotting.

What is so brilliant about The Bell Jar isn't the story (though that is brilliant as well), it isn't the language (though that is most definitely brilliant as well), rather it is Sylvia Plath's ability to feel for others and write what they cannot- it is her incredible insight into humans and emotions. During The Bell Jar instead of feeling like an outsider, reading Esther's story, thinking- like the others- that she just a young tragic woman who lost her mind, I found myself rather tied up in her world. Suddenly she wasn't insane, they were- the doctors and the therapists and her mother and Buddy and the other girls in the asylums that she was sent to. They were all mad, but she was fine. Suddenly, I was with her at every appointment in the offices and waiting rooms, I was there for her during each heartbreak and treatment and breakdown and failed attempt at death. I was looking through Esther's eyes at the rest of the world. It made sense when she thought that every last stranger who passed her by most definitely had some grand plan to harm her, I understood when suicide seemed logical, I believed her when she said that she hadn't slept in fourteen nights. Her mother didn't, her doctor didn't, but I did.

There is a reason why this beautiful, eloquent and tragic novel has survived, still relevant to anyone who may read it, some 50 years later. Yes the times have changed- that much is clear from where the story is in women's rights and medical breakthroughs, but hurt, confusion, joy remains the same- what happens in us, I think, never changes as rapidly as the outside world. Though I am not suicidal and our lives are as vastly different as our ages, I feel as through Sylvia Plath understands me. Each human struggle is individual, but the presence of them in everyone remains the same- Plath is able to simply take that presence and create something incredible that not only connects to everyone, but that forces them to feel. That, I suppose, is what makes an artist.

This is the gift I want to have.

The Book Thief Quote

"There would be punishment and pain, and there would be happiness, too. That was writing"

I tried to write a whole long response to this line, but it ended up turning out far too similar to my Glass Castle post, so I'm not going to put it up. Taken from The Book Theif when the main character is given a journal to write in and told not to punish herself too much for having hurt someone else, this perfectly illustrates where Liesel Meminger and I connect-- on writing being a way to process and think, on writing being brutally honest- reflective of life and where it stands at the moment. We connect not on stealing books or more tangible and visible aspects of our separate, respective lives, but rather on a mutual love for words, infatuation with literature, and on her idea of a library filled with books and pages being such a happy place. Though the length of this post will make it seem as though I have not gotten much out of this, I have. And though I didn't want to repeat myself in a long ramble, I just had to do something with this line.

I wish I were Rory Gilmore.

Rory Gilmore from the tragically cancelled show Gilmore Girl’s is the perfect girl. She is the sweet, personable, mature, driven, smart, graceful young woman. She is small and effortlessly beautiful. She’s got big strikingly blue eyes and can have any boy that she wants, but will never take advantage of it. Rory Gilmore was accepted into all three ivy leagues that she applied to. She goes to Yale but doesn’t have to worry about the money because her wealthy grand parents will pay. She knows who she is, what she wants, exactly where she’s going and you can’t help but to be so sure of the fact that she will, without a doubt, get there. And, more commonly known, (aside from her ridiculously fast talking) Rory Gilmore is the girl who has made a best friend in her insanely perfect mother. She’s the one with that flawless relationship that I- and I think so many others- will always envy more than her small waist or her big blue eyes or her brains or the way that she’s so responsible. I want that more than, I think, pride or maturity or comfort of relatives with money or comfort with myself. Because as much as I love her personality, determination/drive, sweet looks, and frame of mind, really the show's not about that. As much as I love Rory's Grandpa and Luke the softie and Suki's clumsiness, it's not about them. It’s about Lorelai and Rory Gilmore- about their relationship. It’s about a daughter who can, after a terrible day, go home and cry to her mom about it- even in that awkward stage during which she should hate her. It’s about a girl who shares inside jokes and favorite junk foods and secrets and gallons of coffee and heart breaks with her mother.

I have this vivid speck of a memory from when I was seven years old. I’m curled up next to my mom- I used to, even then, like to fall asleep with her in that massive-seeming bed. I didn’t care to admit it to friends because that was the age where everyone wanted to seem older, more mature, more grown-up, and sleeping with my mom was not going to help with that image in the eyes of classmates. We’re both on our sides, facing each other- heads tipped down, foreheads touching slightly like young lovers. She has one arm around me and closed eyes, but mine are wide open and I’m staring intently at her face and thinking about how pretty she is and how I want to be like that someday. Then she squints a bit like she does when her glasses aren’t on because she has such awful vision and whispers to me “Promise you won’t turn against me when you’re older?”. I’d seen the way she fought with my sister and I’d seen the TV shows portraying parents as the enemies in the eyes of a teenager. Knowing that would never ever be me, I nod “Of course”. Then she closes her eyes again and smiles a bit, slightly giving in to sleep "Promise you’ll cuddle in here with me always?”. I grin at that “Definitely”.

I don’t know why I think about that moment so much, why it means anything to me, why I even remember it. I guess it's just a bit of nostalgia, regret, something I miss, a moment I'd like to change and while there are many of those, this one, for some reason, stuck. I often wonder, though, if my mom knew that I wouldn’t keep my word. It’s not fair to ask a seven year old to stick to a long term promise- especially one so hard to keep- and I can’t seem to decide if she knew that and wanted only to be comforted by my response, even if she could anticipate that it wasn’t true. Or if she really did believe me, no matter my age or maturity level. Either scenario kind of breaks my heart to dwell on.

Now I’m fourteen- I don’t sleep in my moms bed anymore and I think that I have done something like turned against her. I don’t remember the moment this happened, and I wish I did, because maybe that could help me pinpoint what the problem was, even if I had no way to reverse it. But despite it all, I still have those moments where I want to run to her massive bed and crawl into her safe arms, where I'm convinced that if I did so, things would be ok- even if only for that small moment in time. But, somehow, I can’t seem to do it anymore. I want to think that if I could only be Rory Gilmore- if I could only have that relationship, if I could allow myself weak moments, be a bit less stubborn, then I’d be happy. If I could only have good priorities and dark hair and big blue eyes and determination and a best friend of a mother, then I’d be just fine.

I’ve realised that there are no ‘Rory Gilmore’s. It’s taken me far too long, but I have realised it. And while there are girls with dreams and aspirations, girls with pretty hair and big blue eyes, girls who go to fancy colleges, girls who are proud and confident but modest and honest and sweet, girls who do what need to be done and don’t forget to enjoy themselves, even girls who have an (almost) perfect relationship with their mother and aren't afraid to admit it, I think it’s fair to say that there aren’t many who are all of that, who have all of that. And despite loving this show more than maybe life itself, I resent the Gilmore’s for putting me through so much before I could find the reality out for myself.

I don't usually write about Harry Potter because I tend to think that it's too brilliant for my words... but I guess this is more about life than him.

***Spoiler alert for those who haven't read the seventh book***

“Does it hurt?”
The childish question had fallen from Harry’s lips before he could stop it.

I know you've read the book, because I put a spoiler alert for those who haven't (and they should've immediately quit out of the page before their eyes accidentally slipped over a few words). But if you've forgotten, this is what Harry asks his parents about death in the Dark Forest when he is on his way to give himself up to Voldemort towards the end of the seventh book.

It took me a long time to figure out what exactly made this line stick with me. Often the kind of sentence that wedges itself into my brain like that is 'deep' or beautifully metaphorical or will inspire me in some way. Often these kinds of lines are obvious in what made them stick to me. But this wasn't. This was so plain. This seemed topical, no hidden layers- it was just a simple question. A pretty fair question, really. Why did this stick out more than a sentence during Snape's last memories or part of Dumbledore's past? Why did it double my tear production, keep me up at night, make me think and think and think about I-don't-know-what.

It didn't hit me until a few weeks ago. Sitting on a plane with a finished book, a dead ipod , and a computer with no internet, I began to type. I wrote three little entries about nothing much really, just about my life or about moments that I thought needed to be captured, theories that needed further developing. I wrote about things that seemed more fitting to be in the pretty notebook lying at the bottom of my bag, but, somehow, came out better when I typed. One such moment that I tried to recreate and think slightly deeper about was this, you won't understand what exactly it is or who exactly I'm talking to, but I don't think that I'm going to try to explain:

-I just want it all to go away.

It was a whisper of an answer that slipped through my lips before I could stop it. Like when 17-year-old Harry asks his parents- at the end of the seventh book- if death will hurt. A childish question. A childish answer that happened all too quickly. It was a thought that made itself into audible sounds forming words without my permission- something I thought only happened in movies and books to characters who weren't real. It left my mind and then my mouth before I had the chance to realise it. Before I had the chance to take that thought and disect it- keeping only the vaguely acceptable parts as though to have some traces of truth left behind- and mix it with what she wanted to hear. Before I had the chance to carve and chisel and polish it into something that was not a thought in the rough, but a mature, insightful, and smart answer. Before I had the chance to create an articulate, adult-like response that showed the growth and acceptance I had been faking.

That was what I did with questions and answers and comments. That was how I talked, communicated, lived. I took every instinct and changed it to what I instinct I was supposed to have, and then into what I was expected to think or say. I remodeled my words to match the face that I was wearing, the wall I had put up, the other girl I was pretending to be. What would she say? What would she think? Then suddenly with one sentence, seemingly simple in wording and length, my cover was broken. I was suddenly vulnerable because this was my real answer. Not my fake response that the other girl inside my head had fabricated. This was my raw and true and honest answer. It was stupid, foolish and immature, irrational and far too hopeful. And it was mine. It was real. It showed that I was not mature, not insightful, not articulate- but, rather I was childish and weak and cowardly. It allowed a peek inside of me, into who I was, how I worked- something that was never meant to be seen or heard. I had, for the first time in what must have been forever, let someone in. Not to say that I hadn't let people in, because I had- friends and such- but this was letting her in on an entirely different level, in an entirely different way. And that, in and of itself, was terrifying.

Harry Potter lives in a world and a time where he is the most wanted boy/man/person alive. His parents are killed before he can remember them, years later he find out about and is reunited with his last remaining family member only to see him killed shortly after. The teacher who he thought to be his biggest supporter and defender, the only man he thought could understand him and protect him was now dead as well. He couldn't be with the girl he loved for so many reasons a teenager shouldn't have to face, had been hiding and running for months, had put his closest friends in danger. They'd all ricked their lives for him and, just moments ago, three had died, in part, because of him. Now he was walking into the forest to surrender and be killed. All before he's even eighteen. And though I often felt that Harry got annoying and slightly big-headed at times throughout the series, I think we can all agree that he has a lot on his plate. Yet he always seems to be brave, tough, persistent, and filled with answers- if not in the inside, in his actual thoughts, then at least on the surface for everyone else to see. He always played that part, depicted that image.

I'm not trying to say that Harry Potter is fake, because I don't believe he is. And in that small moment, I'm not even trying to say that I'm fake, because I don't believe I am either. But I think that, as humans, we often put up walls to protect ourselves or to protect others or for any number of reasons we come up with. And that could mean having a brave face so that the people around you can feel safe. It could mean telling someone what they want to hear so that things are easier, cleaner for them and for you. So that you can be the person you want to be, the person they want you to be, even if only on the surface. It could mean not letting yourself cry to prove to god-knows-who that you are not and never will be weak. But then I think, as humans, we also all have a breaking point. I think that we all, at some point, have a moment where the wall falls down- when you just need to cry or you feel so fake that you can't stand another moment of it or, if nothing else, you just forget and it happens before you can remember. We let our guard down, or it comes down without our permission. For some people, probably, it can happen in a bigger way- an outburst, or a breakdown. For Harry and I, it came in a short line, a simple spoken sentence that could, to others, almost go unnoticed. He, like me, had built up an image and a character for everyone to see- a personality that he had gotten himself into and was now committed to keeping up. Then suddenly in a simple question, he had (maybe even accidentally) shown a different side- perhaps a truer side- which wasn't weak or immature or cowardly. It was only human.

This book hurts.

I don't know why I never read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak- I'd certainly heard a lot about it. Maybe it was my being guilty of judging the book by its cover that wasn't exactly suggesting "my type" of book or maybe it was the specific people that had recommended it to me whose opinion I didn't trust or value or believe that I'd agree with or the concept of death as a narrator I'd heard about that implied an ironic black humor sort of book- definitely not my taste. But then with about a month left before starting high school, I had the novel idea of going online to check for any summer assignments that should have been already completed. And lo and behold, I was supposed to have read The Book Theif. At first, this was a burden seeing as though I wasn't keen on the idea of the book in the first place and being long, it rather interupted my other nerdy reading plans for the last few weeks of summer. However, though I expected to have to force myself to pick it up and read in order to ever finish, it turned out that I rather had to to force myself to put it down for a a 20-minute meal break every once in a while. I devoured the book, often reading a few hundred pages in one sitting. This may have had something to do with the fact that, while reading it, I had two nine hour flights between Alaska and New York on which I couldn't fall asleep and only read/wrote for hours on end. But whatever the reason, those 552 pages flew by far faster than I ever could have imagined.

Set in Germany during the 1940's, you know that this book hurts without me even having to even say it. It revolves around Liesel Meminger- a young German girl- and her learning about, then shortly after falling in love with words, books, writing. She is a girl who goes through more in ten years than anyone should have to endure in a lifetime. Her story is narrated by death- a character who helps you see into people in a way that no one else could. He, while collecting souls of the dead throughout the world in a time when there seems to be more to collect than ever before, follows Liesel through her childhood, often revealing what will happen or who he will visit next, long before it takes place in the story. The language is beautiful, every moment is poetic, and each image is strong.

So I have forewarned you- this book hurts. It hurts simply because of its setting and its protagonists struggles. It hurts because death is the narrator who tells you what will happen before it does which makes a different kind of pain. It is no longer a quick shock that stabs your heart. No, it's suddenly slow and excruciating. It is waiting for what you know is coming, watching around every corner of every page for it to come. It is standing by and knowing what the characters you love don't, it is wanting to tell them and not being able to, wishing to scoop them up out of the story and save them, but you can't. Like things so often are, though, what makes this hurt the most is also why it's so beautiful- the characters and how you are able to see into them. Because this isn't an ordinary book with 2-dimensional, rather undefined supporting characters. There is so much depth, not only in Liesel, but in her mama who curses like no ones business and her papa who plays the accordian better than anyone ever could and in the young jewish man that they hide in their basement who lives to hear her weather reports and her friend Rudy who wants to be Jesse Owens and in the mayor's wife and the angry woman next door who spits on her door step. There is depth even in the boy that they steal apples with and a kid from school named Tommy and the stern nazi who owns the candy store. Every single character is endearing and good somewhere, every single characters finds a little crack in your heart to wedge themselves into. Even death. And that hurts so much, somehow, because when you find yourself loving so much, you suddenly have worlds more to loose, immense amounts of more potential pain to be caused.

This post has done the book no justice and barely began to organize or complete my thoughts on it, but I don't think that I'll ever really be able to do that. It is one of the most endearing, original, haunting, and heartbreaking books that I have ever read. I cannot find words for it.

When I can't talk, I write. And things make a little more sense.

I thought of telling him of binary numbers and the Glass Castle and Venus and all the things that made my dad special and completely different from his dad, but I knew Billy wouldn't understand.
-The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls

That's why she didn't bother to explain it all to Billy or, later on in life, to a professor at her college or the elegant woman in the restaurant. Why she couldn't tell teacher's at school about not having enough to eat, potential friends- or even enemies- about what her life was, about what her home was, what her family was. Because they just wouldn't understand. The cracking, leaking, freezing ceilings, empty cabinets and drunken rages weren't something that she could sum up in a small talk, describe in a simple conversation. Neither were the midnight 'skedaddle's to neighboring states to escape police or tax collectors or gangsters. But, neither were the walks in the dessert, the stories her dad told them, the paintings her mother made, the incredible bond that those four kids shared. Neither were the christmas where she got to choose her very own star for a present or the faith that she had in her father, weak as it may have been growing.

I find myself in a stage of life where, like so many typical whiny teenagers, things don't really make sense. I often have a hard time sorting out, explaining aspects of my own life to myself much less to other people. My mind is a messy jumble of thoughts that, like my bedroom, I cannot seem to keep in order and I try hard to make sure that these thoughts remain as thoughts because should they slip out as spoken words, I don't think that anyone would really understand, including myself. That being said, if I held it all inside my mind, building and piling up, doing nothing, going nowhere- despite being young and all- I think I might explode. So I write. And although I'm not working on a book like Jeanette Walls, I can publish something to my blog that no one reads or pencil it in in a notebook or type something up in Google docs and let it sit there and do nothing with it but somehow understand now that it's all written out. Because although I may fumble with thoughts and feelings and spoken words, once I'm sitting at a keyboard or waiting with a pen in hand, I have no trouble at all in whatever it may be that I'm trying to decipher.

This book is the exact epitome of why I write- it is a way for Jeanette Walls to explain what can't be said simply- the kind of thing that only fits when written. It's a way of describing her childhood so that others, and maybe she as well, can understand. Maybe I don't read enough, and this is really just the point of all memoirs. Even if it is, there's something beyond special about this one. Even writing, I can't seem to even begin illustrate just what this book is, what makes it so strikingly beautiful- if it's the voice or the people or the language- but I think that it's some of everything that makes the best stories. Not being as good of a writer as she is, I'm unsure of how to justify why it's amazing, but really and truly it is. So, just go read The Glass Castle- you won't regret it.

The Diving Bell and The Butterfly

I read The Diving Bell and The Butterfly on a friend's recommendation partially because I trust their taste, partially because I needed a new book to read, and almost fully because of Jean-Dominique Bauby's incredible story that it tells and how it was managed to be told. After suffering a stroke that resulted in locked-in syndrome, Jeam-Dominique was left completely paralyzed- imprisoned in a body over which he had no control, without any sort of contact to the outside world aside from blinking his left eye. This 132 page book was written by him using only his left eye to blink letters to someone typing. And although I knew that it would inevitabley be heartbreaking, I didn't expect a beautifully written, insightful, thought-provoking, and life-changing book out of this. What captured me the most was his memory of small moments that he missed, little pleasures from his old life that would never carry over to his new one. Here are two excerpts where he talks about that:

The delectable moment when I sink into the tub is quickly followed by nostalgia for the protracted immersions that were the joy of my previous life. Armed with a cup of tea or Scotch, a good book or a pile of newspapers, I would soak for hours, maneuvering the taps with my toes. Rarely do I feel my condition so cruelly as when I am recalling such pleasures.

For pleasure, I have to turn to the vivid memory of tastes and smells, an inexhaustible reservoir of sensations. Once, I was a master at recycling leftovers. Now I cultivate the art of simmering memories. You can sit down to a meal at any hour, with no fuss or ceremony. If it's a restaurant, no need to call ahead. If I do the cooking, it is always a success. The boeuf bourguignon is tender, the boeuf en gelee is translucent, the apricot pie possesses just the requisite tartness. Depending on my mood, I treat myself to a dozen snails, a plate of Alsatian sausage with sauerkraut, and a bottle of late-vintage golden Gewürztraminer; or else I savor a simple soft-boiled egg with fingers of toast and lightly salted butter.

Last thursday, I sat inside a cafe across the street from Ms.51, wasting time before a rehearsal that I had to be at at 2:00. School was out for me already as graduation had been the day before, but there was another week left for the younger students. I sipped my iced coffee and wrote in my notebook and felt very grown up, watching the sixth and seventh graders out to lunch- yelling to their friends, strolling into the restaurants and delis where the people knew my order. I heard them each complain as the whistles blew and they slowly trickled back into the building we all considered to look like a jail and I realized what I had taken so for granted and what- they too- were overlooking. I couldn't help but be jealous of each and every one of them for the extra year or two that they would have there that I wouldn't. And when I went to pick up my report card and the teachers were all in a straight row of chairs that I wasn't allowed to pass- a row of chairs blocking off the entrance to what had been my second home for the past three years, the ugly brick building with broken lockers and bars on the windows and hideously painted walls that I'd spent only 194,400 minutes inside of and that held so many of both my worst and most enamoured memories- only then did I realize what was over, what I had lost. It wasn't until then that I realized that these small comforts of my middle school were- not soon to be, but already behind me- it wasn't until then that I realized how strongly I relied upon these comforts or that they existed at all. It hit me so suddenly and painfully in a way that not much does.

I don't mean to compare my experience with moving on to high school to Bauby's condition because it- of course- doesn't compare on any level and I don't claim to think that it ever can. As shallow as my struggles are next to his, this book has made me realize what defines happiness, what is goodness. It's not having a perfect life. I don't think that happiness comes with what anyone pictures or is convinced will make them truly happy. No one has a perfect life, because even when they get what- in their mind- will most definitely make them deeply happy, they want more- that's just human nature. I think that happiness is having little spurs of goodness to sustain you for that moment in time before the next one. Happiness is his warm bath and appreciation for food- happiness is having a school where I know faces and I love teachers and I'm on the top of the heap. Happiness is the forty minutes of freedom we were given with our friends out to lunch that I won't have in high school, it's going into Cafe Martin and not having to tell Martin what I want to drink. Happiness is simple things that are easy to overlook look and are far too often forgotten.

And I'm terrified of this- of time or not having enough of it, of taking life for granted or just taking the small, important moments for granted. Because I don't think that anyone can be happy if they don't see the good in pieces of their life until they've lost those pieces. I don't think that anyone can be happy when filled with the regret of having having overlooked something- no matter the size or importance- that made them happy. I think that it's about more than stepping back and looking at things in prospective and trying to realize your good fortune, or trying to see it all with an optimistic point of view. I do that- or at least I try to. I don't think the idea of optimism or gratefulness is something that people forget about, it's just something that- in the moment- is much more difficult to commit yourself to than it seems. Maybe it's because we lose faith in ourselves or in other people or in the world or in life or in whatever religion we claim to be faithful to. But this underlying fear that comes with almost everything I do or say or think or feel is that I somehow won't have control over it- as if something will dictate my thoughts, monitor my words, change my actions, take authority over my feelings. As if something will keep me from appreciating these moments given to me or not let me recognize the good things in my life. Something will hold me back, something won't allow me to be happy. Or maybe I'm just afraid that I won't allow myself.

This is why I read.