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What I Wanted to Say

Friday I was scheduled to deliver a reflection on one of the seven last words of Christ. I was to give the first reflection, on Luke 23:34 Then Jesus said, "Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." It proved to be a reflection I needed to write, but it also proved to be another lesson in forgiveness, as I had to forgive myself for making a promise I could not keep. I could not stand long enough to give a 6 1/2 minute reflection, and it became apparent that someone else would have to step into my place.

My replacement called me and told me that reflecting on these particular words proved to be a blessing to her as well, and I later heard from others of the healing nature of her words. And so I accept that this was her time. And yet, I also, probably selfishly, feel that this was also my time to write these words, and they are not meant to be kept hidden, but were perhaps meant for this space instead, as a meditation on my own personal journey. So I post them here, today, so that they do not interfere with those Friday reflections, but so that they too may have life.

Reflections on Luke 23:34

Then Jesus said, "Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."

When I try to imagine Jesus on the cross, and the terrible pain and burdens of that day, it continually amazes me that Jesus’ first words were not “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me”, but were instead “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do”.   Forgiveness is hard, and I’m not convinced, had it been me, that I could forgive first, without first railing and screaming at my fellow men and even God himself, before reconciling myself to forgiveness. Feeling abandoned is easy. Forgiveness is hard.

But that is the crux of what Jesus is teaching us, that forgiveness is paramount and that all other things must follow. Forgiveness must come first. It is not something we must reconcile ourselves to, but something we must embrace.

It seems I’ve been learning a lot of lessons about forgiveness. I learned to forgive my spouse for the raging and hurtful things he said when he was suffering from dementia. I had to forgive him the hundreds of times he threatened to divorce me, the times he called me names I could never repeat, the times he said I deserved every unkind word ever uttered, the times he said I was impossible, ungrateful and unworthy of love, the times he said I was lucky he put up with me. I knew in my head that it was the disease not the person, but forgiveness has to come from the heart, and my heart wasn’t ready. In learning to forgive him I also learned to forgive myself for being angry, for being hurt, for wanting to hurt back. In forgiving him I learned to forgive myself for suspecting that all those word were true, for believing I was unworthy and ungrateful. In forgiving him I also gave him a gift, whether he was aware of it or not, the gift of freedom from responsibility for my pain.

It doesn’t matter if someone hurts us intentionally or unintentionally, by holding on to that hurt we chain ourselves to the person who hurt us and those chains keep us both from grace. By forgiving we open a door that allows healing, a door that, by necessity swings both ways. For we cannot find grace as long as we are crippled by pain and the urge to hurt back, to suffer, to see ourselves as abused, damaged, ignored or unappreciated.



We are all human, and as such we are imperfect. We never know the true impact of what we do. We try to follow God’s will, we try to follow truth, with a whole heart. But we often fail. When we forgive, we are not saying that what was done was right, or that the pain does not exist, but we are breaking a dual burden. We free ourselves of the burden of our hurt and anger, and we free those who have harmed us from the burden of our pain. The surprising thing about forgiving others is that in doing so we learn to forgive ourselves for being less than the perfect people we could be and we learn to accept who we are and to love ourselves. Only then can we truly love others, knowing that not only are we imperfect, but they too are imperfect, that we are all imperfect together.



After my husband died I once again found myself questioning who I was and my place in the world. I found myself questioning how I came to be the person I am.   Once again I found myself coming face to face with the need for forgiveness.

I grew up in a small town, and it was in many ways a wonderful place to grow up. I was fortunate to have a father who adored me and whom I adored. But being my father’s daughter was not always easy. He was a man who loved to challenge hypocrisy, a man who savored confronting those whom he saw as narrow-minded, or worse, ignorant, a man who often used intelligence as a weapon. I was a sensitive child who wanted everyone to love everyone else. I was also a child who had scoliosis and wore a back brace for 5 years. People are not always careful about what they say around children; I knew there were people in town who referred to my father as “that heathen” or worse, I knew there were people who believed that my scoliosis was God’s retribution for my father’s sins, I knew there were people who claimed to be my friends, but who actually pitied me and felt I should be thankful for their attentions. To protect myself from their pity, I hid behind intelligence and indifference and pretended that I didn’t care. Eventually I even convinced myself it was true.

But those pitying words had taken root somewhere in my heart and had blossomed into a deep-seated sense that beneath it all I really wasn’t worthy. That insecurity drove me to be fiercely independent; it drove me to excel because I always had to prove myself, not to my professors or employer or coworkers, but to myself. To that inner child no achievement was enough. And it was that inner child that made it so difficult for me to discount those raging words that dementia sometimes brings, that inner child that made me doubt myself. And this is where I truly learned that forgiveness is paramount. I needed to forgive that child who was hurt by the unkind words of others. I needed to forgive that child who lashed out at pity, that child who talked back, and challenged assumptions. I needed to forgive that child for hiding her secret hurts, and for rebuffing people who probably honestly meant well. I needed to forgive the woman who hid that angry child deep in her heart. And I needed to forgive those people who never meant to cause harm, but who were themselves doing the best they could with the beliefs and circumstances and events that shaped their own lives. In forgiving them, I suddenly found that I could love them, that they were, indeed, all just like me.

In learning to forgive we learn to love. I am still learning that lesson. But I see far more clearly that so much of what becomes hurtful in the world is often well intentioned. And truly we all need forgiveness, for we never know what we do.

photo courtesy navybluestripes photostream on flickr, here.

April 19, 2014
Good Friday

A long, long time ago, on the first day of Passover, three men were crucified. The life and words of one of those men changed the world. He was a Jew. The night before he died, following the tradition of his people, he celebrated Passover with his friends, his disciples. At that Seder, some of the words he used, in a ritual tied to tradition, but not necessarily tied to it strictly to the letter, became the basis of a new ritual, the Eucharist celebrated by Christians around the world.

Passover is a ritual of spring, of being spared by death, of exodus, of being freed and saved, which is therefore also a rebirth. Jesus was a Jew and saw himself as a Jew. He spoke to his fellow Jews, but as he also made abundantly clear, he spoke to all people, not just the Jews. Easter, the celebration where Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus is a celebration of rebirth. Spring is the earth’s celebration of rebirth. New bunnies hop around the hill behind my bedroom window. The Easter Bunny will soon be scattering brightly colored eggs for small children to seek out and find. Bunnies and eggs are also powerful symbols of birth and rebirth.

There is a reason we celebrate the transition from winter into spring, from slavery to freedom, from darkness to light, from death to rebirth. Part of my family is celebrating Passover. Easter falls in the midst of Passover this year, and some of us are focused on the rituals and celebration of Easter. Still others will be content to contemplate bunnies and eggs painted bright colors, perhaps chocolate eggs as well. These traditions may intermingle and overlap. We are all one family and as such we can embrace and accept each other’s traditions.

It seems sad that far too often we humans focus on our differences rather than our similarities. Good Friday, and the events it commemorates, is a reminder of how we let our differences divide and separate us. It is a reminder that we all suffer at times from isolation and pain. But it is also a prelude to rebirth. Perhaps in this season of spring, of rebirth, of awakening, we can all share a moment of joy. There is room for all. We are all one family.

April 18, 2014
Walking and Reading

Oh how my state of mind has improved since my last post. I am walking steadily! Granted I am still only moving about for short periods of a few minutes each, but I am steadier on my feet, and I can stay up long enough to actually walk outside, to the mailbox even. I cannot begin to describe the thrill I felt at accomplishing such a simple task. I can heat myself a simple lunch, I can make a sandwich. There is much I cannot do, but I am no longer completely dependent on others for everything. The power such simple tasks hold is not to be discounted. At the same time that first trip to the mailbox was surprisingly difficult. It was further than I anticiapted, nearly 100 feet each direction. But each day I go a little further, do a little more, and I am filled with hope. I know not to push to fast, to move slowly, but even progress at a snail's pace is encouraging. Now if only I could sit, I could eventually get out into the world…

Still, it is not all bad. Now that my mind has calmed somewhat my knitting is moving along nicely, although not as quickly as it would be were I able to sit (yes a small complaint). And I am able to once again able to let my mind drift into the pages of a book and lose track of time. In that, I was very lucky in my choice of books to read this past week.

Churchill and America by Martin Gilbert is a book that had been on my reading stack for quite some time. Truth is, I had been putting it off, thinking that I just didn't have the focus to really concentrate on it. I have read part of Gilbert's biography of Churchill, which is excellent, but Gilbert can be a bit dogged and I wasn't sure I was really up to it, much as I admire Churchill.

Well, I was mistaken. The book is fantastically interesting, and it is not at all a classic biography, as it is for the most part fairly one-sided. You get the story of Churchill, and his relationship with America through his own words, through a lifetime of letters, speaches, telegrams, and various odd communications. The story is tied together with bits of communication from those who knew him and worked with him. In the end it is a highly personal story, very human, and very moving. At many times I would find myself in tears and had to stop reading. Over half the book concerns WWII and it was one of the most moving approaches to that war I have read.

The second book is a novel, The Visitors, by Patirck O'Keefe, a novel I might never have discovered were it not brought to me by a new friend, who explained that the author had just recently given a talk at the UT Library and she hoped I would enjoy the book as much as she.

It is a profoundly lyrical and beautiful novel, but not necesary an easy read. The novel is told by Jimmy Dwyer, an immigrant from Ireland living in Michigan. Time and place are interwoven throughout the novel as Jimmy's thoughts and memories wander, interweaving the past and the present as he constantly remembers, relives, and rediscovers himself and his relationship to his family through the refracting lens of time and changing relationships. It is a novel that is at times tragic, and certainly melancholy, in how history plays itself out and repeats itself, and in how Jimmy learns that the past is always with us, no matter how much one wishes to escape it. O'keefe's prose is breathtakingly beautiful. He captures Jimmy's voice perfectly and he is fully and complexly realized. The interleaving of time and place is expertly and subtly maintained and captured in the nuances of voice that define different places and relationships. This was an exquisite book that I will not soon forget.

April 16, 2014
Dancing Tulips and Darting Thoughts

Spring and Tulips seem to go hand in hand don't they? I had just snapped this pic, when I wandered over to Mater's blog and saw more beautiful tulips twisting in a vase, like dancers stretching their limbs.

My tulips are up on a high shelf, the top of a bookcase really, and they are stretching downward toward the light and also toward me. As I lie in bed it seems like they are beaming at me with smiling faces, and they vaguely remind me of some happy memory from one of the Oz books I read as a child.. This is what I love best about tulips, how they appear so upright and formal, but given the opportunity they twist and dance, unfold, and eventually, if one is lucky, open up in rich exuberant abandon, in one last flush before the end. We should all age so well, with such life.

The tulips are a reminder of spring and promise and good things, because although I am improving, sometimes it seems that progress is harder to bear than the the lack thereof. Before, moving at all was such a struggle, that I was content to be perfectly still, content to be without pain. Now, I can actually get up and move around pretty well, but only for a very short time, a few minutes, far fewer than one culd count on the fingers of one hand. I leap up (well not quite) with joy and try to see how much I can do before I am jerked back down with pain, only to try it all again a short time later. I wonder if this is the way a dog on a chain feels, trying so hard to get at something desired, but always pulled back. It makes no sense, but it was easier when I could do nothing. I had no expectations so all I could do was hold on to what joy I could find. Now I want more.

Perhaps those same frustrations are echoed in my reading, in that I seem to be reading a lot, but at the same time I feel like I am getting nowhere. But of course this is different, although it is possible that a general sense of frustration pervades my attitudes, therefore influencing my mindset.

An article in last week's Washington Post however, has stuck in my mind and caused me to further ponder the root of my frustrations. The article discusses how reading on the internet seems to be affecting our attention span, our ability to read and focus on longer sentences or ideas, our ability to read and absorb ideas deeply. The point is that our brains are plastic and what we do affects how we gather, absorb, and store information. It occured to me that this reflects on my own lifelong struggle with reading the news vs reading books. I've always read the newspaper, more than one paper in fact, but I have, at different periods read them more or less thoroughly. I read fast, and I tend to skim, reading the headlines and the critical paragraphs of most articles, and only reading a few in depth. I go through periods where I pay more attention and periods where I pay less attention. The problem is that even when I pay more attention to the news and news magazines, I always feel like my brain is full of stuff (the world) and yet simultaneously empty of true knowledge. I feel like my thoughts are darting here and there searching for something tht is just out of reach. I feel like that dog on a chain, reaching for knowledge and yet abrubptly pulled back without gaining my objective.

With books the rewards seem greater: I might not know what is going on in Pakistan, or the Left Bank, or even the opposite side of my own town, but I feel like I learned something, I feel like I gain knowledge and understanding which affects my view of the world.

This sense of empty frustration is not new, I felt the same way pre-internet, when the only way to keep up with the news was to read physical newspapers. Now that I read most of my news online, and the article seems to confirm this suspicion, I feel even more empty headed, as if I absorbed more from the physical paper than from the online version. Perhaps I should go back to a physical subscription of one or two newspapers? Will I read them? Or will I just be accumulating more paper waste, for a very small gain in actual insight. Both the NY TImes and WSJ have online versions that are closer to the actual paper. Both versions also have kindle versions, where I can simply read the articles linearly, one right after the other. Will I focus more on the kindle than on my computer screen? What is the cost vs reward ration here?

Or is it better to read the news online and then read one or two magazines in their paper form? I like reading The Economist and will usually read it cover to cover. The Atlantic and the New Yorker also rate highly on my "likely to read" scale. Perhaps I need to set aside a focused time just for news and internet stories, say an hour or two a day of reading with my morning coffee. Last year, I set aside one day a week as "unplugged", and doing so did wonders for my mental well-being, although I've recently abandoned it. Perhaps I need to reserve some slow time as well, time to read something that requires attention, something that creates its own space in the brain. I seem to be more suited to depth, I don't want to lose that ability.

April 14, 2014
A Little Friday Shoe Shopping

Here it is Friday already. Not only that Friday is half gone. That is the problem when your days all blend together, in some ways they slip through your fingers too quickly and before you know it they are gone and you have nothing to show.

Not that having something to show for your time is probably all it is cracked up to be. I suspect it is good to slow down; it is good for me to slow down, although I can also admit that my life at the moment is a little slower than I might have liked. But perhaps it takes time for lessons to truly sink into my thick skull.

The point is I can't say I have much to report this week. I've read one book, I'm 3/4 through with Churchill, I've done a tiny bit of knitting. I look at the mail far more closely and thoroughly than I did before; when you are on muscle relaxers and neurlogic medications there are times when looking at pretty pictures is more than enough to keep you content. Of course there is always the internet as well, but that is more dangerous, internet shopping-wise anyway,

I did however need a pair of flat back shoes. I've been putting it off for months, but now seemed like as good a time as any.

What do you think? Sorry about the not so glamorous cell-phone shot.

I'm inclining toward the pointy shoes on the left. They are both pretty, they are both comfortable. But I already have Varas, he version with the small heel, so I don't particularly need the same shoe in its flat, Varina, rendition. The pointy shoes make me feel a little more sleek, a little sharper, perhaps a little wicked. That's not such a bad thing.

April 11, 2014
Never Say Never

It seems some lessons are never learned.

Some weeks ago I got a bee up my bonnet about raglan sleeves. Said I hated them and would never wear them. I should know better. Since that time it seems that everything that catches my eye has a raglan sleeve. Not only that I actually want to figure out how to fit them correctly. Perhaps my reactionary peevishness was just a reflection of some internal shift. Generally I am a firm believer in the adage "never say never", and I should know by now that every time I get myself all worked up about something I don't want to accept, it actually means I'm right on the cusp of letting go of some long held bias.

Frances, over at Materfamilias Writes, called me on it. She asked if I liked raglan sleeves in a sweater, and so doing she made me think (egads!). I do have a raglan sleeve sweater that I love. It is this one:

Linden, knit in 2009. If you want to be reminded of the details you can find them here. This sweater is a bit warm for Knoxville, but it saw quite a bit of use this winter and I do believe it has a future as a winter jacket on warmer winter days. Here is a picture of me wearing it at that time. The fit isn't perfect, but I love it anyway. Hopefully my next raglan sweater will be even better.

Yes, there will be a next raglan sweater. I have started a collection of them over on my ravelry page and have plans to knit something up for this summer. In the meantime, don't hold your breath. I've still got to work my way through several small projects.

April 9, 2014
Monday

There are times that I am lying in bed reading, and I stretch my legs or roll over and I feel exactly as I was, as if the world is full of possibility and I can leap up at any moment and plunge headlong into the glories of life. In those moments I feel I am still a young girl and the world awaits, full of promise. The promise is still there; I am improving, although slowly, but now there is also temperence.

That does not mean there are not moments of joy. I have rediscovered the joys to be found in simple pleasures. This was my breakfast on Sunday, a current favorite, although it this particular combination never crossed my mind before I was confined to bed. I have also rediscovered how contented I am with a supply of radishes, cucumbers, baby carrots, berries. I dream of the spring crop of baby turnips, and have developed a renewed appreciation for the simplicity and goodness of roast chicken. There is just something special about a lovely plate beautifully filled with a few tempting morsels…

I have settled into a state of fuzzy contentment. Well the fuzziness is due to medication, which comes with all kinds of warnings about not driving, or operating heavy machinery, etc etc. I see no warnings about riding unicycles. I wonder…..

No, I know better. It is actually fine that the drugs make me light-headed because I don't really move very fast anyway. They did fog up my thinking apparatus for a few days. I had to abandon Churchill and I haven't started my next knitting project due to a profound inability to count to 400. I am feeling a little sharper today, so I believe knitting will resume.

So I resorted to some light reading. A friend brought by a couple of the Mrs. Murphy mystery books by Rita Mae Brown. The first book I read, Sour Puss, was somewhat enjoyable but was mired in too much detail about viniculture and the diseases that affect grapes. It was also a little too preachy, especially in the conversations between the cats. But it wasn't so bad that I didn't want to read the other book, which was much better.

The second book, Catch as Cat Can, which is actually an earlier volume in the series, was much more enjoyable. The writing isn't particularly better, but at the same time it doesn't take itself too seriiously either. I enjoy the animals and their conversations and observations about their humans. I also enjoyed the story and its setting more than I had in the previous volume. It is definitely light fiction, but it is an entertaining, relaxing read and I will probably look into reading more of the books in this series.

Finally, as part of the Kindle First program, I downloaded I Am Livia which I finished early this morning, and which I absolutely love. This is not surprising. I remember watching I Claudius with my parents in the 1970s, and later, when I read the books by Robert Graves, I loved them even more than the mini-series. I also devoured Colleen McCoullough's series of novels about ancient Rome. Livia has been much maligned in history, but I am not sure how much truth there is in these stories and how much is reactionary vilification toward a woman who lived outside the normal expectations for a woman of her age. This novel paints attempts to pain a more flattering portrait of a strong-willed and impetuous girl, a girl who has a sharp intelligence, a girl thrown into difficult circumstances, a girl who demands to be accepted for who she is without apology. It is not a difficult novel and I highly recommend it to people who like historical fiction with strong female characters.

April 7, 2014
Oops

Yesterday evening, after a rushed and busy few minutes when I actually had guests, and help feeding cats, and dinner and got myself a little over extended and in a bit of a dither, I finally decided that I should pull out my knitting bag and take care of that dangling tail at the end of those lovely new striped socks.

I was quite surprised however, when I looked in my knitting bag and found the first pair of toe up socks, apparently forgotten, languishing alone, unloved, and unworn. In a panic I rushed over to purlsandmurmurs to write a post, which is up now. And then I discovered that I had indeed put a photo of the socks up here. But why had I shoved them back in my bag? How could I forget something I spent hours knitting? Granted that first pair was in a predominantly cotton yarn, and I prefer wool socks, but they are still lovely and perfectly wearable.

Then I wondered if perhaps I was loosing my mind, if perhaps I had indeed been so overextended that I had lost control. Perhaps I was so eager to grab hold of the world after a prolonged feelings of isolation that I was like a small child who had been told I could have everything I wanted in a candy shop and I didn't know how to stop. Maybe I was just pushing my mind and my body too far too fast.

But I don't believe that, not completely. It is too easy for us, as humans, to try to justify things, to blame ourselves, to look for patterns, to say "its my fault", to try to find a reason for why things happen. Sometimes things just happen. Yes there are probably reasons. But we probably do more damage worrying about the reasons than if we just learned to do the best we can.

Enough fretting. Today I am going to read. I will probably start another knitting project, Perhaps this weekend I will be able to do a little needlepoint. Perhaps I will try on swimsuits. It seems I will be in Texas, once I can travel again, and Mohonk in July, and its been a few years since I've worn a swimsuit. I'm not sure what I think about that yet, but a couple of packages have arrived. We'll see.

April 4, 2014
Socks

Spending a fair amount of time lying down with an ice pack at the base of my spine seems to mean that my feet are always cold. And I've found that wool socks are the best antidote. I'm cycling through my collection of handknit socks rapidly these days.

I had hoped to finish this pair yesterday, but yesterday did not rate highly for focus and concentration. So I dithered, finishing them up in the wee hours, during a booming thunderstorm, with the final few rows rounding out my breakfast entertainment. Just in time for happy toes. Photographic evidence to the contrary, they are actually the same length.

These are the second version of my basic, pattern-free toe up sock, and I got the niggly little details perfected here, at least for me. I am happy with the socks, so happy that I literally pulled them onto my feet as soon as I bound off the last stitch. The tail on the sock on the right foot hasn't even been woven in yet. I'll do that later today before they are washed and blocked, at which point the little stitch lines showing the gaps between my dpns will disappear as well.

Next up will probably be a scarf, but I am so involved in reading Churchill and America, that I may not start until tomorrow. Fascinating book, poignantly filled with quotes from Churchill's letters and speaches. The struggle and the emotion are palpable.

This has been basically reposted, with a dearth of additional technical information, over at purlsandmurmurs.

April 3, 2014
Reading In Bed Part Two

My reading slacked off somewhat this past week, and I spent more time idly looking at this or that or doing not much of anything. I think it was time well spent, this lollygagging, so I have no particular complaints.

I did spend some time just listenting to music. A friend brought by a recording of the Brandenberg Concertos because she knew I had missed the two-night performance of the complete cycle as I was already confined to my bed, and I was grateful to lie back and just listen in comfort. I also discovered radio David Byrne and spent some very happy time listening to a playlist of new, at least to me, music. I seems I had been so busy and so focused on other things that I had forgotten about the pleasures of just listening to music, and not just classical music, but popular music, music where listening to the words is an important part of the beauty of the songs, such as in the songs of Mark Kozolek (Sun Kil Moon). I was also particularly taken by the beauty of the songs of Anna Calvi, both artists previously unknown to me, and whom I will now seek out.

My reading material was basically of a light nature. I started out with two non-fiction books, neither one difficult but then realized that my focus was waning and settled into a slow, contented reading of light fiction.

The non-fiction books were Malcom Kendrick's The Great Cholesterol Con, which is filled with lots of information but is also written in a very fun, entertaining and accessible way. I don't know that there was a lot of material in the book that I hadn't read elsewhere, I started doing a lot of research on diet, cholesterol, fat and so forth after reading Good Calories Bad Calories a while ago, and have become a pretty regular reader of certain medical and scientific journals related to those subjects ever since. But Kendrick pulled the information together in a way that I felt was particularly accessible and I felt he made his points clearly without going overboard on either polemics or numbing the general reader with too much data. I would say it is a very good introduction to an important subject and should be read by more people.

Then I read Anthony Colpo's Whole Grains Empty Promises, which I believe only exists as a kindle edition, because it was being offered free of charge when I downloaded it, although I believe the price has goine up to $2.99. The book was worthwhile for the extensive notes and references to the research, which make up a significant part of the short book. But aside from that it was easy to read and Colpo did an excellent job of explaining why whole grains are not necessarily the be all and end all of great nutrition. His information is based on solid research. Given his research I can understand the antagonism toward the establishment view that pushes whole grains, but even so I found his writing to be overly sarcastic and inflammatory. I wish his tone had been more measured.

About this point I was finding it harder to take notes or underline passages in books, and was also feeling less inclined to read anything I had to think about it much detail, so I decided to move on to light fiction.

Next I reread The Princess Bride by William Goldman. Now I first read this book my freshman year in college. It was already a couple of years old by then, but this was long before the movie came out and I can say this, much as I love the movie, and even though the movie is really quite true to the fairy tale part of the story in the Princess Bride, the movie has just a shadow of the depth of the book. I love this book, it always makes me happy, but it is so much more than a swashbuckling, fairy-tale romance. I lvoe the way Goldman frames the story within another story and the way that framing story uses the fairy-tale to tell a far more profound story of why books matter, and what we learn from them, how they shape and expand our views of the world, and how that world shapes us as he interlayers stories of publishers, aspiring jewish writers and the ways and ridiculous spoofs of fairy tales and so many of the common dreams we all hold dear. If you think about what the story actually says, it can really make you question all those basic assumptions about love and happiness, good and evil, and yet at the same time, the story can be extremely satiric and questioning while still leave me feeling profoundly happy. Kudos to Mr. Goldman. I've read this book probably 5 or 6 times in the last 38 years, every time I read it I find it both more absurd and more profound, and it always leaves me ridiculously happy.

Next up was Lunch in Paris by Elizabeth Bard. This had been on my list for a long time and I don't know why I never got around to reading it because it was really a lovely and charming story. I like the way the story interleaves the discovery and interweaving of a new love, with the story of moving to a new cutlure and finding one's adult path in life. The author skillfully blends the sense of isolation of finding one's path in a froeign culture and alone in a new environment with the completeness of the romantic relationship, and she also skillfully navigates the ways in which one comes to terms with knowing oneself and sorting out one's fantasies of life in order to get at the kernel of what is true. I suppose there is more I could say, but put simply, it was a delight.

I read The Replacement Wife by Eileen Gouge primarily because a friend recommended the author. I thought it was pretty good but annoying too and in the end I found it sad. I started out thinking I would like the protagonist, Camille Hart, but quickly thought she was far too self-satisfied and a good bit on the over-controlling side as well. There was a lot of miscommunication between the characers and damage that could have been avoided had they just been willing to talk to each other. The basic point of the story is that when Camille learns that her cancer has returned and has metastasized, she decides she is going to die, and she also decides that she needs to find someone to take her place for her husband and her children before she dies. But she gets to control who she chooses, and she wants him to accept her choice, but not get too involved at the same time. In short she is working from her head, and from her own unresolved issues surrounding her mothers death when she was 14 and unresolved issues with her father arising from that same event. In the end everyone gets hurt. Yes the husband behaves childishly also, but I am more inclined to forgive him because I don't see from the story that Camille every understands the way her actions felt like a complete betrayal of trust to him. In the end, she lives, they get divorced, and the husband remarries. It seems from the story he learns something about himself and about openness to relationships, and Camille seems to grow up a little but she still seems somehow to have missed something critical. Maybe I jut took the whole thing too seriously.

March 31, 2014