80 Books
Eighty books. I’ve never read so many in one year. And this was quite a year for literature. Contemporary literature. I think readers/people in general might be longing for something essential. Despite all the reports of dwindling reading, the depth of so many of the popular novels was really inspiring. Or maybe it’s just that my genre of choice is literary fiction.
Short stories can still escape me. Some seem to revel in extreme abstraction and live with a floating quality that leave very little take away for me. I don’t find them haunting, which seems to be the reason for lack of concrete ideas. It’s like a meal that isn’t filling. But then once in a while, it has the power of a Chekhov or Hemingway. It lilts still, but taps at the door of something. You know that if you let it drift, it will lead and land.
So, often I feel I’m missing something. I feel the same with certain poetry. Like I need a translator. The essence that the poem is trying so earnestly to waft, dissipates before it reaches anything. Makes me feel incapable, dim, shut out from the club. The Paris Review helped mitigate this feeling. I’m thankful at the end of the year for the grounding beauty that magazine gave me. To each his own, surely. I’d like to see what others see in “floating” poetry, or feel it, rather.
This evening I started a course called Winter Writing Sanctuary. A very cozy, very welcoming online 7 day writing course – or “invitation” as the author calls it. There was a visualization offered – 10 minutes of the usual, breathe, relax and get present at the beginning. Then there was a journey through the woods. A three hour hike and a visit from a small robin. The continuation of the winter walk led to a cabin and inside you chose who was there. It was my Dad. There he was and the visualization said there was a conversation to be had. It was simple and went like this:
Dad: Suzy don’t cry.
Me: I miss you Pop. I don’t have a lot to talk about. But I don’t want you to go yet.
Dad: I’m right here. It’s all just a journey, a trip. We all have our lifespan to walk through and then there’s the next thing. (something like that)
(I found this comforting)
Me: I feel sad. And I worry part of me is broken. I feel a little lost and busted by those I was with.
Dad: It’s just their journey. They walk a different path.
Me: Yes. I see that’s true.
(and here he actually leans forward – something my Dad didn’t often have to do to get my attention. And he grins – his storm-blue-eyed grin.)
Dad: But their path doesn’t have to be your path either.
At the end of this little visualization, there were tears down my face. A release of something. Although we all walk together, we have to walk our own way. We’re not obliged to follow anyone or even understand where they’re going – nor they, us. Why does that make sense in the middle of winter, the middle of the night 12:45 a.m. with the wind they promised two days ago blowing like mad in the naked tree branches.