World Wide Word Web

Sometimes I think I should take a hiatus from the Internet. My head is filled with so many words, pictures, links, ideas, stories, names, events... Just words, words, and more words, every minute of every hour of every day. It seems I can't ever read enough New York Times articles or get through enough McSweeney's stories or laugh at enough hilarious animal photos or appreciate enough of the thoughts of the countless creative people in the world... There just isn't enough time.

My email inbox often gets terribly overwhelming. I do my best to communicate with friends and family regularly. But personal notes can get lost when there are floods of appeals from organizations asking me to sign a petition and donate money and take action and show up at an event and sign another petition and then they send me a thank you email for signing it, and oh, don't forget to give money! MoveOn, Planned Parenthood, ASPCA, American Humane Association, GEMS, the Brooklyn Museum. My inbox is also jam packed with all the fun and exciting things I can do, buy, see, do, eat, buy, do, buy, buy buy! Groupon, NYC Daily Deals, Living Social, The Bowery Presents. Things I love. Causes I support. Experiences I desire. Communications that are scrambling my brain...

Oddly enough, raising money for a cause and managing communications are in my job description. So I can't ignore the Internet completely. I can't just make the words go away. My work day consists of sitting at a computer and type, type, typing away about children and parents and families and lawyers and social workers and family court and abuse and neglect and sad stories and happy endings... Email is unavoidable. I get Google alerts that I can't ignore. I need to know what's going on in the world and the country and the city... I need to know what's happening in the courthouses down the street and in the government buildings in D.C. and in the offices down the hall. These things are not expendable.

But what about the rest? Perhaps I need a break from the emails, the sites, the blogs, the news, the feeds, the banter... I felt a serious sense of relief yesterday when I cleaned out my friend list on Facebook without remorse and walked away 30 individuals lighter. I also felt a sense of accomplishment when I reorganized my Google Reader into three categories and then alphabetized them all. And instead of feeling finished, it made me itch to organize my bookshelves into fiction by author and nonfiction by subject. So many items to read, so many people to meet, so many ideas to acknowledge, so many things to learn, so many words to try to cram into my head... SO LITTLE TIME.

The best lesson I ever learned is that the more you learn, the more you realize you don't know. So you should just keep learning and reaching for as much knowledge as you can attain. But I suppose the more time that passes, the more you realize how little time there is... You have to accept that you can't learn it all. I sure as hell can't read it all. Perhaps I just need to disconnect completely. Less Facebook? Sure. Ignoring the more fluffy stuff in my Reader? Done. Unsubscribing from a few email lists? Probably necessary. Writing more instead of passively reading? Now there's a thought...

I suppose I could just read more books, though not surprisingly, when I'm not reading things on the Internet, I'm reading a book instead. And I end up reading a hell of a lot of books. But goddamn, even that stresses me out, because with every book I finish comes the realization that I'll never read them all. There are simply too many words in the world. And I don't know where to begin. I also don't know where to end...

I guess right about here is as good a place as any.

Things

It's 12:01 a.m. and I should be in bed. Not just IN bed, but asleep. Not reading, but sleeping! I could have just curled up with a book (right now it's Run River by Joan Didion), but noooo. I felt the need to express myself.

I accomplished something on my list from the other week. I sorted through my jewelry! I got rid of a ton of stuff and filled an entire shoebox of things that I never wear and will soon send them off to my dear friend. These are not terrible things. They are things I used to love. Things my mother used to love. Thing I never wore. Things I forgot I had. Things I can't believe I ever bought in the first place. Things I got as gifts so I have an excuse for not liking them so I shouldn't feel bad about getting rid of them. Things I don't like. Things I don't need. Things, things, things. Now I've gotten to the point where I've repeated the word "things" to the point that it sounds weird and has lost its meaning. And I'm not just talking about jewelry now, am I?

I mean STUFF. Whew... For the most part, it's just that I don't have time for all of it... I don't have space for these things... these objects... materials.... I don't have physical, mental, or emotional space. There's only so many things one can be attached to, but how to choose? It's hard, so I don't choose. I cling. I have a difficult time letting go. I'm a hoarder! No I'm not, but I probably could be. I watched a show on animal hoarding tonight and, among other things, it made me want a bunch of tiny kittens and birds and puppies. That's NOT the point of the show. It made me think of my deceased pets and I got sad. Moving on...

When I was cleaning up my dresser and getting rid of stuff and forcing myself to throw away bobby pins rather than save them (but you always need them!) because they were mixed in with clothing tags and those little plastic things that clothing tags are attached with and dirt and other random bits of stuff, I thought of my childhood bedroom. It was always a mess, but it was my glorious mess. Much like my room today, except that I share it with a guy and he probably hates his life. Anyway, at one point in my childhood I decorated my window with CANDY WRAPPERS. This is not a joke. Someone gave me a pack of some sort of delicious, fruit-flavored, European hard candies that came in these magnificent little classic looking wrappers that made me feel like I was picnicking in the Italian countryside or sitting in some little Parisian cafe. So I saved the wrappers in a box and stumbled across them a few years later and finally one day, flattened them all out and taped them down the side of my window in "rainbow order" of course: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple. And that's where they stayed until I moved out of there at age 17.

I look on my bookshelf and see books that I have owned for years, books I never really had an interest in reading since I got them as gifts or secondhand, and then one day decided to pick up... and I loved them, so now of course I can't let them go. And still, there are books I have owned for years and I still have no interest in reading. It's just that I hope one day I will. And so I think I keep all of these things for hopeful reasons, thinking that one day this piece of clothing will suddenly come back into style or I will shrink down to fit into it again (they've both been known to happen), that this piece of jewelry I never wore will suddenly seem beautiful (it's also happened), and maybe one day I'll actually light that candle or put flowers in that vase or draw in that sketchbook or put that picture in a goddamn frame. More likely I won't. But the hope is there.

And until that hope dies, as it thankfully did for everything that sits in that shoebox this evening, I will be mired in things. In stuff. In materials. In confusion, mostly... But at least I will always have something to read. Or wear. Or give away... Which is probably the best hope for me at this point. Any takers?

Book Roots

I have been flying through books lately, but haven't felt that the quality has been quite what I should be reading. Most have been just fine (Oates, Erdrich), but some have been crap (Gaiman). Luckily, some have been awesome, and luckily I read three of those in the last week. Mostly because they were young adult novels and were very easy to read. But also because they were seriously, no joke, hands down, without a doubt...AWESOME. And had I read them when I was an actual young adult, I would have been even more obsessed than I am now, and that says something...

The books are "The Hunger Games," "Catching Fire," and "Mockingjay," a trilogy about a teenage girl living in a horrid post-apocalyptic society who is forced into fighting for her life in a reality TV show, and the revolution that eventually ensues... Craziness. I decided I wanted to read some young adult fiction since when I saw the most recent "Harry Potter" movie in theaters I vowed to read all the books by the time the last movie comes out in July. I think I can do it. It's written for children, come on. So I thought, while I find a way to get someone to buy me the entire HP collection (it can be used, it's cool, go buy it for me) so I don't have to wait for the next book from the library or wherever, I'll go ahead and read another YA series, because I felt like it might be good for me. And it sure as hell wasn't going to be that vampire bullshit.

Ugh, I saw one of those crappy movies with my little sister and wanted to puke, let's see, pretty much the WHOLE TIME. What a lousy, sniveling, pathetic little heroine. Quit whining over your pale sparkly boyfriend and get down with the wolf boy for Christ's sake. Thank God that "The Hunger Games" has a badass, horribly flawed young heroine who doesn't always make the right choices, kills people, reluctantly leads a revolution, does some terrible damage, and gets pretty damaged herself in the process. That's my kind of heroine! Katniss would totally kick your ass, Bella. I'm really glad I read those books and I am miserable that they're not coming out with a movie until next year. What the hell? That's ridiculous. Hurry up, Hollywood, get on this shit. Make it awesome.

So anyway, I loved these books now, and I would have loved them even more as a kid. I mean, LOVED. Why am I not 12 again? Oh wait, cuz being 12 sucked. But I digress... Anyway, I have always had this crazy fixation with dystopian societies. I blame 5th grade and "The Giver." Damn you, Lois Lowry, you ruined me. I have also always loved war stories and horrible tales of young people dying. I blame 5th grade again, for its lessons on the Civil War and our trip to Gettysburg where they showed us all the tools used in a battlefield amputation. Gross! I also blame my mom for taking me to see "Les Miserables" that same year so I became obsessed with the French Revolution as a 10-year-old. THAT IS NOT NORMAL. I also blame Anne Frank, of whom, for a short time in my young life, I believed myself to be the incarnation. That's weird. Now I am all grown up and just plain morbid.

Anyway, this post really has nothing to do with anything besides the fact that you need to give proper credit to young adult books and the power they have over young and old minds alike. The books I read as a young girl, like those of Scott O'Dell, Jean Craighead George, Katherine Paterson, etc. really shaped me as a reader and made me want to read more challenging literature. I mean, hell, I plowed through Shakespeare and Victor Hugo as a 5th grader. Did I remember much? No. Did I skip over large quantities of text? Yes. Did I expand my vocabulary immensely? Hell yes. Did I understand all those big words? Hell no. But I read them, goddammit. I read UP. And now, as an adult, I can look back and realize that it's okay to "regress" a little bit and read DOWN, to read books aimed at younger readers. They remind you of the person you were, remind you of why you are the person you've become, and they take you back to those initial questions and interests... They remind you of why you became an English major in the first place. Wait, you mean it wasn't to study the gradual flattening of dipthongs in Western Maryland dialect over four generations? It was to READ BOOKS?!? Oh my god, that's crazy. Why did I waste so much time??

So I decided that before I take on my silly Harry Potter challenge, it was time to read something respectable. And by that I mean depressing, dark, historic, and absolutely miserable. So I went to my bookshelf and after poring over a few Vonneguts and Hemingways and "Catch 22," I decided to go to the motherland of sorts, to 19th century British literature, that genre I completely disregarded in college to focus on Old English and Existentialism. So now I'm reading "Wuthering Heights." And miserable it is! Oh those Brontes, they were such lighthearted little ladies. Like me!

I'm baaaaack...

Laziness

Last night I caught a snippet of Fran Lebowitz being interviewed by Jimmy Fallon. Let me clarify: I do not watch Jimmy Fallon. It was purely by chance late at night at a friend's house. And it could barely be called an interview, but I digress. I vaguely knew of Lebowitz. Just the name, really, and the fact that she was a writer. Nothing more. I summed her up quickly in my terribly judgmental and stereotype-loving mind. New York Jewish Liberal Intellectual Lesbian Writer.

Except for being liberal, we don't really have much in common. I am not a real New Yorker, I have only a vague notion of a religious upbringing, I am of average intelligence, I am straight, and I barely write. Then my mother and I were watching "Pretty Woman" tonight after all the relatives left, then started flipping channels. Again, allow me to clarify: I do not usually watch lame 80's romantic comedies, but sometimes it happens. It's acceptable now and again, I believe. Anyway, Lebowitz was on Charlie Rose, and this time, I actually listened to the interview. Then I Googled her. Then I felt better about not knowing anything about her since she has really only written a few books, which I do believe I'll read. And then I found this quote:

"I've never met anyone who even comes close to me in laziness. I would have made a perfect heiress. I enjoy lounging. And reading. The other problem I have is fear of writing. The act of writing puts you in confrontation with yourself, which is why I think writers assiduously avoid writing. The number of alcoholic writers makes a lot of sense because if you're going to be face to face with yourself, maybe it's better that you don't recognize that person."

It was in this 1994 article in the New York Times. And it made me feel better, because while Fran and I may not have much in common, this quote pretty much summed me up, though I'm no alcoholic. It also mentioned that she's hypoglycemic, hence why she doesn't drink. I have diagnosed myself as such, yet I still drink. Perhaps too much, perhaps not enough. Brilliant. I have found inspiration.

I would have made a lovely heiress, too, Fran. If I had all the time in the world, I would just sip red wine and snuggle in blankets and eat good bread and just read Read READ all day and all night. I would probably write even less in that case, because I would be ashamed of my laziness. Perhaps that's why I don't write at all anymore, except on this sad excuse for a blog. Perhaps it's because I don't feel like I have anything to say. Perhaps it's writer's block. But you have to be a writer first to catch that terrible disease, and I don't think I qualify. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

Now here is the part where I will compare Fran and myself. Can I call you Fran, Fran? Will you be the next female writer that I come to idolize for a few weeks or months and then discard? You will? Great, thanks. Anyway, Fran does not like avocados, which she equates to being the mayonnaise of vegetables. I absolutely agree, and that's exactly why I love them so much. She has gone through a decade-plus-long period of writer's block. I have not, but I feel like I have. It's not really the same. She smokes a lot. I try not to smoke, but I love it. Smoking is delicious and disgusting. Disgustingly delicious. Also, she thinks giving books to children is important. Duh. But some people are terribly stupid and don't think that's important. I dislike those people. I like Fran.

Now I'm bored with this post, and no one is going to read it because it's terrible. But if you do read this, ask me about Fran Lebowitz the next time you see me, because if I haven't picked up one of her books yet, then I just lied about having found inspiration. Don't make a liar out of me.

Happy Thanksgiving!

My Library

I just found an interesting little snippet in the New York Times. It cites a study proving that children who grow up in a home with a library have an academic advantage -- a three-year advantage, to be precise. Regardless of the education level of the parents, kids with access to lots of books at home are also more likely to finish college.

My first thought was, DUH. Of course kids who are exposed to literature and information will do better in school! When children are surrounded by the potential for intellectual exploration in their own homes, of course it's going to help them in school. I mean, would I have read Romeo & Juliet in fourth grade had the book not been on my shelf at home? Of course not! And would I have graduated college as an English major had the book not been available? Hmm... Well, most likely. I think nerdiness is just in my DNA.

The point is, this article further justifies my penchant for buying and hoarding books. I have always planned on having a library in my home. I simply can't wait for the day that, from the comfort of a big old armchair, I can gaze around the room and see books lining every wall, sunlight streaming in onto the pages of my current literary obsession. My goal to own every book I've read, and those I haven't read yet, is really just an investment in my children's education, right? Won't it be nice to say, "Go read a book. We have 2,000 of them," when confronted with a bored and bratty kid? And all without having to leave the house...

As much as I love libraries, and even as I start to consider more seriously a Master's of Library Science, I don't use them very often. I just got my first library card from the Brooklyn Public Library after living here for more than two years, but I have only been to the tiny library on Cortelyou Road. I have yet to explore the main building by Prospect Park, which I hear is sprawling and beautiful and I have only ever seen from the windows of a cab. Of course, I still strongly believe in the value of public libraries -- not everyone has the money or space or even the desire to own hundreds (or thousands) of books. Plus, there are plenty of terrible books out there, and who wants to keep those books around the house? So although I recognize the social need for libraries and may quite possibly make a career out of them, I still want a library of my very own...

As a child I used to get lost in libraries and never want to leave, but what I enjoyed even more was buying books -- I wanted to see my books sitting on my shelves, knowing that in the inside front cover I had scratched my name in childlike cursive. Sounds selfish, but I really just wanted to be able to revisit certain beautiful passages and interesting characters on a whim. I absolutely hated to return a book I loved -- it saddened me to drop a book that I had fallen in love with through a slot, knowing I was relegating it back into obscurity on the shelves. The only thing that gave me comfort was thinking of the others who had read that book before and would read it again.

In college I loved to wander through the Fordham library finding the strangest books imaginable. I could sit for hours in the linguistics section, delving deeper into the intricacies of language and mind, desperately trying to find some way of including my newfound text into the essay I was currently ignoring. I became an expert at finding books, and I can't tell you how many times I showed fellow students, often those I was tutoring, the magic of discovering what lay in those seemingly endless stacks and how to find exactly what you were looking for. The search itself was, of course, part of the magic.

Of course, I can't imagine that I would have this strong love for libraries and a strong desire to have my own had I not been surrounded by books as a child. Some of my earliest memories involve my mother reading to me -- apparently I requested Goodnight, Moon so often that she hid it from me for a while since she was so tired of it. While she read to me more often, I always loved it when my father did, because he was the one to give the characters distinct voices, as dads tend to do. We didn't have thousands of books or a terribly organized "library," if you can even call it that, but there were always books in the house for me to leaf through.

I also remember when we got our set of encyclopedias, before they were made obsolete by the Internet. I was so excited to leaf through the heavy, alphabetized texts, bound in forest green with gold lettering -- it seemed like I had all the knowledge in the world at my fingertips, and I would just read and read, mostly about exotic animals or historic women. Speaking of women, I also remember spying a copy of The Second Sex on the shelf, which terrified and intrigued me. Upon picking it up I immediately realized I had no idea what Simone de Beauvoir was talking about and quickly put the book back in its place.

I might buy a lot of books, but my new rule is that I buy only used ones. Therefore, the Strand is now my new best friend. And should I dislike a book so that I find no need to keep it on my shelf, well then, back to the Strand it shall go. I only really buy paperbacks (the more beaten-up, the better) because they're light and easy to carry and cheap, so that I don't feel bad when I dog-ear the pages. The only new books I have decided to buy will be The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, which will be leatherbound, goddammit. And someday, I will purchase a comprehensive Oxford English Dictionary, which I will need a magnifying glass to read.

And all those little paper books that I have read and loved and reread and recommended, I will keep forever. They'll stay on the shelves of my apartment, the shelves of my parents' home, in boxes if need be, and someday they will come out and sit permanently on shelves built just for them, and they will be beautifully organized. And I will give my children a three-year advantage on their less well-read peers, and they will never, ever be bored.

Literary Slacker

I've been a blogging slacker for the past few days... Clearly I am losing the Blog Challenge 2010 miserably. But I think I can be forgiven for not posting every day, since the sheer length of my other posts is just ridiculous. Brevity is just not my strong point, as I'm sure will be shortly illustrated.

Anyway, last night I went to BAM to see The Tempest, which was pretty damn good. Prospero was excellent, as he should be... Miranda was a little annoying, mostly just her voice I suppose... but her part really isn't that big, I realize. It's been a while since I read the play so I guess I gave the sole "major" female role a lot more credit than was due. Caliban stole the show, unsurprisingly, though since they cast a black man in the role all the lines just seem so terribly horrid and racist... However, Shakespeare might have actually meant it to be that way, since the character is supposed to be the son of an Algerian witch, the only "native" of the island... Ahh, the 1600s weren't exactly politically correct.

Regardless, it was good to see a Shakespeare play for the first time in a very, very long while. I really ought to do more culturally significant things like see plays, but I just don't seem to get around to it. Next weekend, however, I'm going to see "The Cherry Orchard," which I actually haven't read. I think the only Chekhov play I have read is "The Three Sisters" in my Modern European Drama class during junior year of college. How odd, since I consider Chekhov one of my absolute favorite writers. I can't remember if we read "Uncle Vanya" in that class or not... Oh well. I've read most of his short stories on my own, over and over again since early high school when I opened up some literature textbook and found "Lady with a Lap Dog" and was hooked. I didn't even know who Chekhov was or how famous he was, I just knew I liked the story.

That's somewhat similar to my discovery of Kafka around the same time. I found "The Metamorphosis" in probably the same textbook and was enthralled, and again, had no idea how famous Kafka was. I just knew that the story was absolutely bizarre and probably had some deeper meaning that my 14-year-old self couldn't quite grasp. I'm not sure my 24-year-old self even grasps it in the end. That's the problem with taking philosophy classes throughout college... You think you understand the underlying meaning and the real symbolism of all these strange literary works, because the professor tells you so, then you forget what you wrote for your essays and tests and you reread and rethink things years later and realize you don't actually have a damn clue and you probably never did.

The same with Shakespeare, though the deeper "meaning" is more just getting through the language and historical rifts than uncovering some underlying message. How easy it is to understand when you're sitting in a class with 30 other English majors who are about your same level of interest and intelligence, being told by the professor exactly what the lines mean and then arguing with each other about the deeper levels of meaning until you uncover your thesis for your upcoming paper, and then you really start taking notes... As I was watching the play last night, I found I could only really get about half of what was going on, just because I haven't been exposed to that language recently. On paper it's pretty simple for the most part, but for 2 and a half hours I found myself a bit lost.

I found this very ironic and somewhat disappointing, since I remember seeing "Romeo & Juliet" at the National Theater when I was in 5th grade, and since I had read the play over and over after I discovered a copy of the book in a box in the attic and saw the movie on TV, I understood every word. My father kept leaning over to me and asking if I understood what was going on, and I would nod and shush him, since I did understand, and I wanted to absorb every single word and action without interruption. I realized he didn't understand, however, so later I translated some lines for him later, with pride. Watching "The Tempest" I realized I didn't have the same familiarity or emotional connection with the text... But I'm not 10 years old anymore so I'd think I have a better understanding of Shakespearean language than I did then!

Once again, this makes me come to the conclusion that I have to read and reread and think and rethink all those literary works I've been exposed to, or should have been exposed to, and I have to do it every few years. From Shakespeare to Chekhov to Austen to Faulkner to Steinbeck (he's one of my formerly favorite authors who I haven't read in many years) I need to keep myself up to date. But I also need to read new works by new authors... And I need to sift through the past and read all those classics I never read in college since I concentrated more on the International Phonetic Alphabet and dialect change than great classic literature.

There's only so much time to read so many books, but I really need to be more conscious about choosing things of substance and not wasting my time with fluffy crap. Not that I ever do choose fluffy crap, but I just need to be selective and diligent and stop wasting my time. Except for David Sedaris, I am not allowed anything I would deem "light reading." Those days are over.... though I don't think they ever existed in my life anyway.

Right now I'm reading "The Elegance of the Hedgehog," having put down Joan Didion to resume at a later date... I really needed a novel instead of essays, and I'm reading it for my book club. The characters in it make me want to read more, anyway, especially more philosophy. There was a chapter on Husserl and phenomenology, though she advises to read Kant and Descartes first. NO WAY. I will draw the line there, because there's no point in reading great works if you're not even going to enjoy them. So diligence about reading also involves not pressuring myself to read mind numbing works of greatness.

Works of greatness, however, I need more of in my life...

Goodnight Moon

I just got home to Brooklyn. I took a surprisingly relaxing, uncrowded, late afternoon train, during which I started and read almost half of "Slouching Towards Bethlehem" by Joan Didion -- this book is destined to become one of my favorites, I can already tell. As soon as I got to the city I cabbed it over to Cask for a Book Club meeting, where we somehow got very tipsy on only 2 drinks each. Hmm... Anyway, the next book we're reading is "The Elegance of the Hedgehog," which promises to be just lovely.

Speaking of books, I started to reorganize my bookshelf at my parents' house this morning, and I've vowed to reorganize the one in my apartment as well. I love organizing books... Nonfiction by subject, fiction by author... Beautiful. I also found my old copy of "Goodnight Moon," which will probably always be my favorite book in the whole wide world. Now I'm tired and must go to bed... So...

Goodnight, dish. Goodnight, spoon. Goodnight, cow jumping over the moon.