Feeling marginally better, I dragged myself off to work this morning but by 12, I was exhausted. It's that weariness that makes even breathing seem like too much work. Doesn't help that I've developed a cough. I have however retained consciousness and don't have the splitting headache of the past three days, so I managed to power through Stephen Chbosky's The perks of being a wallflower. I thought I was in love almost from the start of this book, it was just so fabulous. Emotive and well written, but above all so relatable, I just wanted to hug it and never let go. I didn't want to stop reading which is so nice compared to the stuff I've been struggling through lately - for uni or post-modern purposes, they've been the kind of books that feel like work, that require me to really concentrate and for whatever reason, I never feel fully immersed. Perks was the complete opposite of that and I immediately felt tied to the story, to Charlie, and oh-my-god how we're so very alike. I'm not really into the ending, I don't know. Maybe I'm used to stories that sort of meander, without real rhyme or reason. Perks easily draws comparison with Catcher in the rye (one of those books I love so completely but I don't even really know why), but there's never any real reason given for Holden being the way he was. He just was, and things ended the way they did because that's the way they ended (oh my eloquence, it blinds me!). For some reason, I felt the ending of Perks tried to add gravity where it wasn't needed, addressed an issue that may have been better left alluded to, instead of teased out and finalised the way it was. It's a beautifully told coming-of-age narrative all the same, but I often find the power lies in what we aren't implicitly told. That may just be me, I don't know. Regardless, the first 100 pages is some of the most perfect affective introspective narrative I've read in a very long while.
Just reading the note on the author, I see Stephen Chbosky helped create and produce Jericho, one of my favourite television shows. Never would have picked that.
My dad has arrived home from Afrique Du Sud, bearing various trinkets from various well meaning relatives. He's complaining about the dust everywhere, but seeing as he wasn't here to witness the full extent of the madness, he can't really appreciate the consequences. We've been told to expect another dust storm tomorrow, and from the footage from rural NSW, it looks like it's going to be almost as bad as the first one. Therefore I wisely didn't wash my car, although I did have to hose it down this morning in order to see out the windshield. It really is gross though, everything is caked with red sand. If I wanted to deal with this sort of thing, I would have lived in the Outback. Bah.
I'm actually hungry for the first time in days, so I think I better act on this while the feeling lasts.
We, soldiers of a different sort,
We, wasters of ink and page,
We, warriors of words,
Masters of melancholy,
harlots of the pen,
We bleed these volumes,
and expect only absolution.
[ Jarvis Black ]
Music: Asleep - The Smiths
Mood: Tired
