 Reader Questions III |
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I sent a request to my notify list for reader questions. I'm going to make my way through them gradually. Here goes round three! (Round one is here and Round two is here.) If you could live the life of any character in literature, who would it be? Cassandra in I Capture the Castle or Emily in Look through My Window. Just because. Melody: You write a lot about books that you love to read. What was the first book you fell in love with? The first book you stayed up all night to read? My first memory of holding a book in my hand and devouring it is B is for Betsy which my next door neighbor, a librarian, brought to me in about second grade. After that, I became aware of what the library was and became obsessed -- OBSESSED -- with going constantly and checking out stacks of books that I would stack under my chin not unlike Gus Gus the mouse in Cinderella with his stacks of cheese. I know I loved all of the Boxcar Children books when I was really young, and Trixie Belden, and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and every single thing by Lois Lowry, and when I got into the middle school years, I was obsessed with Love Story and The Catcher in the Rye and The Outsiders. And of course before and after that I read every Judy Blume and Babysitters Club and Sweet Valley High and I'm not ashamed of any of that. I could go on and on and on and on and on, but B is for Betsy is heralded by my mother as my first "big girl" library book, so it really started it all. Geraldine: I know you love movies and books--but what is your absolute least favorite of each? No movie has incited my ire in recent memory like Vanilla Sky. As for my least favorite book, that's a tough one. Lots of times I read books to which I am wholly indifferent, but I can't remember one that I hated enough to really get bent out of shape about it. Actually, and I'm sure that this might really appall some of you, but I hated Atonement. I hated it because the beginning was so enthralling and amazing and the end was crap. Oh, and I hated The Little Friend and I wish I could get the time I spent reading that book back. Zero payoff. Suck. Hated that book. All in all, Donna Tartt makes me feel icky inside. But I hated neither of these books with the intensity with which I hated Vanilla Sky. Alan: If you were granted 2 weeks vacation and unlimited funds where would you travel to and why? First I would have to go to New York and see every show I could possibly want to see because going to shows makes me happy, and in the words of Dana on Sports Night, it's kind of like church. Then I guess I should go some place I've never been. I'd really like to go to some of these places because I love those books. And I'd like to see Tintern Abbey because this is one of my favorite poems of all time. 'tis her privilege, Seriously. What is not to love about that poem? If you went to confession after JournalCon what would you have told the priest? I would confess that I was insensitive and immature in a moment of middle of the night delirium and hurt my friend's feelings. And I would ask the priest hopefully if God is as forgiving as my friend. Do southern people really eat grits or is it a bad joke on the rest of humankind? What is the problem with grits? How are grits any different from cream of wheat or oatmeal or any other hot mushy breakfast cereal? Of course we eat grits! Grits were a staple of my childhood breakfast diet. We ate grits and bacon, no less, and I would make little rows in my grits and sprinkle the bacon down the rows like the bacon crumbles were crops growing in my grits garden. I like my grits salty and peppery and buttery. I think putting anything else in grits like cheese or garlic is reprehensible. (Of course, the other night when I had grits and scrambled eggs for dinner, I tried melting a string cheese in my grits, and it was not a pretty sight. So I stand by my anti-cheese grits theory.) Toast and bagels are excellent when dipped in grits, and scrambled eggs are perfect when mixed in. Grits plates are messy plates, and I love messy plates. I've never understood freakish people who cannot bear for their foods to touch each other. That's not how we eat at my house. Megan Can you tell me when I'll feel better? Do you just wake up one day and it happens? Do I have to meet someone new? When will it stop? That, my young friend, is the question. And I'm going to have to quote another poem here to get my point across. Oh, love is the crooked thing, The answer, of course, is that there is no answer. It's different for everyone. You will hear from everyone you know that it will take time, and it's trite and everything, but it's true. I love this Yeats poem because he's so right -- there's no sense wringing your hands trying to figure it all out, or to determine when you're going to get over it or understand it -- because you can't. You can't know when or if you will figure it out or when or if you will fully get over it. You just have to keep breathing and eating and living. You are twenty, you say, and chances are that while this is the first time this has happened to you, it won't be the last. (Harsh, I know.) When I was about your age, I embraced a totally cheesy poem that I'm not even sure is an actual poem, but the last part went something like, "And you learn, and you learn, with every goodbye, you learn." You'll pick up the pieces of yourself that have been smithereened by this break-up, and part of you will always be different, because you'll carry with you not only the pain of the loss but all that you're learning from it. And you probably can't see what you're learning now, but someday you will look back, and you'll be proud of yourself, and stronger. You mention that you are bombarded with memories all around you, and that is normal. (I don't know why I'm all about the poetry today, but "Time does not bring relief" by Edna St. Vincent Millay captures this feeling for me like no other poem on the planet. Fuck. She kills me.) The memories are just part of it, and you can't try to avoid them. I've found that it's best not to fight or block those memories from flooding in, because you can't help remembering when you wore that shirt or heard that song or ate that kind of ice cream or seeing and hearing and smelling and tasting and feeling him in every single thing around you. Just let the memories come, and hopefully with time, the flood will abate somewhat and all the twinges of pain you feel with those memories will be balanced by the times you can meet them with a sad little smile that no one can see inside your heart but you. Accept that you can feel a wistful happiness and a deep sorrow at the same time when remembering him and what you shared. Nothing says oxymoronic emotional state like a break-up! And above all else, know that as horrible as it is, you are surrounded by a world full of people who have dealt with heinous break-ups and lived to tell about it. Look around. Here we are! (Waving.) You are more resilient than you know. Don't try to put a timetable on your grief or set some kind of time limit on when you should be "over him." There is NOTHING wrong with you for still being in grief mode six months later. You WILL feel better as time goes by, and you will love life and yourself and even someone else again, but know that part of your heart will always hold onto your first love. If you meet him walking down the street when you are eighty years old, you will be moved by the sight of him. When I was your age, I was sitting in a car outside a party sharing a bottle of whiskey with a fellow waitress after work one night, and she was 27 or 28, and she told me that about first loves. And I knew she had been through it, and I trusted that what she was telling me was the truth. And it was, and it is, and it ever shall be, and it's okay. You'll be okay.
Getting On with It
When the heart stops oozing blood
When the heart slows
© Copyright 2003 elb |
::: "A person can have feelings for someone even if they're not like, THE person anymore." ::: "There are so many different ways to be connected to people. There are the people you feel this unspoken connection to, even though there's not even a word for it. There's the people who you've known forever who know you in this way that other people can't because they've seen you change. They've let you change." (Can you tell what DVDs I'm making my way through?) |
