The last two weekends, I feel as though I am settling into graduated life. As my friend Claire told me, "Don't be so hard on yourself." I am sure that a lot of people have said this to me over the past almost two months, but for some reason, it sunk in when she said it. I have been working on a writing project for a couple of weeks, but I haven't written much since last week. While I normally would be upset with myself, I have been reveling in reading what I want to.
Ever since I finished Aimee Bender's The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake in September, I have been having a hard time finding writing that will keep my attention. I have recently become a fan of fiction again, but fiction that sometimes I might be embarrassed to admitting, though who I am I trying to impress, really?
After much hesitation, I started and finished Brady Udall's The Lonely Polygamist. I have never met Udall, though he teaches at BSU, where I got my degree. I have always heard mixed reviews of his teaching--and his ratemyprofessor rating seems to paint him as a less-than-desirable-instructor, but man can that guy write. Last May, while on a trip to the coast, I found Udall's The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint on sale at Powell's books. There was a huge stack of the paperbacks, being sold at a the discounted rate of $4.00. I took pity on them, as I often do, because the author was from my hometown. If there are so many, I thought to myself, then they must really be bad. Maybe they expected to sell more, but people saw this for the tripe it was. I picked up the book anyway and was immediately enthralled. I felt almost the same about The Lonely Polygamist. It's a complicated story about a polygamist family--four wives, one husband, 28 children--and the entangled web they create and live. I read the 599 pages in two days and was only disgusted by one part near the end (which I won't ruin in case you are going to read it) where a twelve-year-old boy ejaculates on himself. I brought the ejaculation seen up last night during dinner at a nice restaurant with my family while sitting next to my mom. Now I am not quite so confused as to why my mom shouts my name as though I am a teenager in trouble though I am an adult, and I am not confused about why people usually look disgustedly at my family while we eat. I used to just think it was because people thought we were pigs dressed like slobs, but it turns out it's the talk of ejaculation, dick jokes, and yeast infection table talk that drives people to other tables.
Last week I ordered The Truth of the Matter, The Best American Essays, 2010, and The Best American Non-required Reading, 2010.
I ordered The Truth of the Matter at the urging of a friend who said it might jumpstart my writing and give me some new ideas. It has started to, though I have set it aside for a bit to indulge in some pleasure reading instead of craft reading.
Then I have The Best American Essays, 2010, of which I still have to start sitting on the nightstand. I rarely read the Best American Series from cover-to-cover because there are usually a few essays that don't pique my interest. And long ago I found that if I a book was not interesting me, it was okay to put it down. I suffered through many a bad book until I realized there were a lot of things I would rather be reading.
The Best American Non-required Reading, 2010, contains two pieces, "War Dances" by Sherman Alexie--which I think is nonfiction--from his book War Dances and "Fed to the Streets" by Courtney Moreno which I think are great. "War Dances" is about the narrator's--maybe Alexie's--battle with a meningioma on his brain. "Fed to the Streets" is about Morenos' work as an EMT in Los Angeles, and I found it interesting that she had a moment where all of her training, which she excelled at in school sort of escaped her when she found herself on-the-scene with real patients. I have a friend that was once an EMT, and one of his biggest complaints is that he got so nervous when he actually ended up being with patients that he wasn't sure how to react and felt like he was faking it. It was good to read that his experience was normal for most EMTs, though it seemed Moreno got over hers and quickly ended up in burnout phase.
After reading The Lonely Polygamist, I have found that I am longing for novels with flawed and complicated characters while finding page turners that make my free time fly by. So, yesterday, I visited the library.
I checked out The Finishing School by Muriel Spark which I started last night and finished this morning. It was pretty good, though very odd.
Next on the list is Ann Packer's The Songs Without Words, and it seems like a total chick book, and I am okay with that so far. And then, Joyce Carol Oates' We Were the Mulvaneys which was on the Oprah Book Club list. Something we'll only see how I do with.
I feel bad about not writing more on my writing project (which is obviously very secretive), but I also know that part of being a good writer is reading a lot, something I am trying to do.
If you have any suggestions for me, leave them here now, and I will check them out.
