So the title for this blog comes from my love of reading. One of the principal reasons I love reading is that it provides multitudes of other worlds and other lives in which I can briefly immerse myself. I like my life very much, but get inordinate pleasure from forgetting for a few hours that I even exist, and plunging into some other adventures or concerns. Fiction is my favorite destination, but reading news on the internet, and other people's blogs, can satisfy the itch.
Every once in a while, when I am longing for story-like excitement in my waking world, I remind myself that all my favorite stories involve just ordinary people, living their ordinary lives (though extraordinary obstacles may sometimes be thrown in their way). The author selects judiciously from the myriad moments and incidents that make up the characters' lives, but in the end all fictional lives are just like real ones--full of minutiae, obligations, and the need to put one foot in front of the other and keep moving forward. And that is what makes up any grand adventure, when you get right down to it.
Anyway, what brings me to this explanation is: I keep checking this blog to see if it's changed! No kidding. I come and look to see what's going on in my life (where are the moments and incidents??), and--here is the kicker--I am disappointed when there is nothing new.
This is why I have never, despite dreams and the partially-written novel on my hard drive, become an author. I forget that I'm the one who has to do the authoring!
3 comments:
Novel! I don't know about no stinking novel. It's amazing all that I learn anew here. HTMYF?
If you really like to read, please read all books mentioned through this link: http://www.augusten.com/books.html
Can you suggest some must-read books to me? -Sarah
Hmmm--I'll try to think of my absolute favorites. My recent reading has been odd and eclectic. I re-read the Chronicles of Narnia series (cute, and much shorter than I remembered).
Right now I am reading vol. 3 of the diaries of Victor Klemperer. These books are amazing. Klemperer was a jew living in Dresden throughout the Nazi era. He was married to an Aryan woman so was not sent to a concentration camp for a very long time; then on the eve of his deportation, the firebombing of Dresden occurred. Everything was in chaos, he tore the yellow star off his clothing, and he and his wife escaped north. Shortly thereafter, the war ended, so he made it through.
The volume I'm now reading recounts the post-war years. I'm at the beginning, and he describes what it's like to go back to his own house (which was taken away, occupied by others who were abusive to him, and now he has all their stuff!) and have former nazi party members coming to him for character references. It's really interesting!
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