What is past is prologue

It's a funny thing about the modern world. You hear girls in the toilets of clubs saying, " Yeah, he fucked off and left me. He didn't love me. He just couldn't deal with love. He was too fucked up to know how to love me." Now, how did that happen? What was it about this unlovable century that convinced us we were, despite everything, eminently lovable as a people, as a species? What made us think that anyone who fails to love us is damaged, lacking, malfunctioning in some way? And particularly if they replace us with a god, or a weeping madonna, or the face of Christ in a ciabatta roll-then we call them crazy. Deluded. Regressive. We are so convinced of the goodness of ourselves, and the goodness of our love, we cannot bear to believe that there might be something more worthy of love than us, more worthy of worship. Greeting cards routinely tell us everybody deserves love. No. Everybody deserves clean water. Not everybody deserves love all the time.

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"It seems to me," said Magid finally, as the moon became clearer than the sun, "that you have tried to love a man as if he were an island and you were shipwrecked and you could mark the island with an X. It seems to me its too late in the day for all that."

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"What a peaceful existence. What a joy their lives must be. They open a door and all they've got behind it is a bathroom or a lounge. Just neutral spaces. And not this endless maze of present rooms and past rooms and the things said in them years ago and everybody's historical shit all over the place. They're not constantly making the same old mistakes. They're not always hearing the same old shit. They don't do public performances of angst on public transport. Really, these people exist. I'm telling you. The biggest trauma in their lives are things like recarpeting. Bill-paying. Gate-fixing. They don't mind what their kids do in life as long as they're reasonably, you know, healthy. Happy. And every single fucking day is not this huge battle between who they are and who they should be, what they were and what they will be. Go on, ask them. And they will tell you. No mosque. Maybe a little church. Hardly any sin. Plenty of forgiveness. No attics. No shit in attics. No skeletons in cupboards. No great-grandfathers... Because it doesn't fucking matter. As far as they're concerned, it's the past. This is what it's like in other families. They're not self-indulgent. They don't run around relishing, relishing the fact that they are utterly dysfunctional. They don't spend time trying to find ways to make their lives more complex. They just get on with it. Lucky bastards. Lucky motherfuckers."

----------------

Some excerpts from Zadie Smith's novel, White Teeth.

Hope these will serve as reminders for most of us.

Envy is the new pink

As far as I remember, I have never envied anyone in my entire life.

Never. 'Cause I have never known anyone who had this kind of opportunity.

Sometimes, Intimacy

Sometimes, they called it Name Your Memory. Sometimes, Intimacy. It was a game they concocted together. A game they were proud of.

They were feeling a little tired, the afternoon they invented it. They were surprised at how exhausted they felt, considering that they have just known each other for four months or so. Hence, the need for a game, a ruse, a new distraction.

The rules of the game were deceptively simple. One of them would drop a name of a person or a place casually during insignificant parts of the day. Sometimes, one of them would play a song. Because they weren't allowed to ask questions, the other person would have to guess.

After the clues have been laid down, the name-dropper waits. He (or she) would try to sense if the other person guessed who or what the memory was and what it meant to him or her. They believed that it would help them keep track of each other. It would help them eradicate the stilting commotion that secrets usually bring.

Once the other person guesses what that memory was, s/he would write it down on a journal that they shared. This is where the game becomes more elusive. This is the part where skill comes in. The guessee should write down a code that the other person has to break in order to know if s/he guessed the memory correctly or not. But because they were new lovers and new lovers are prone to invent their own kingdoms and languages , they managed the whole affair pretty well.

So they tiptoed around each other, dropping names between silly conversations, singing songs while walking home, mouthing inconsequential phrases as they kissed each other through glass windows. They were never bored but they were always restless, untangling their furled histories.

They told each other, there was never intimacy before we came and conquered the world. For seconds, they knew happiness.They never wanted the game to stop.

But one day, while they were sitting on the porch, the woman uttered a name that the man was unfamiliar with. He let the name stand there between them for a while, like an unwanted couch. Then he forgot it when she told him about how her day went.

Later that evening, she played a Spanish song. Furious violin strains whirled around him. He still could not guess what the memory was.

When they cuddled in their small bed, she spoke that name in her sleep. She spoke the name backwards for three times. He was so frightened by this change in her that he shoved her awake. When she opened her eyes, she asked him what was wrong.

This went on for two months. By now, the man was bent on finding out what the memory was. He, who used to be superfluously curious, now looked through bits of paper that she left in her bags. He tried to decode her sentences and tore them to pieces when he was alone. He looked through her purse, through her magazines.

Their journal, which used to be filled with languaged silk and words of exclusive endearment was now dusty and untouched.

She was fraught with insipid changes. To a stranger, her mood swings would mean nothing. But because he believed that he knew her, he became bothered by her sudden wishes, by her whining.

He does not understand this new game- her leaving him out.

Then one orange afternoon, she played the Spanish song again. She sat on a wooden chair that they bought together a year ago. She just sat and looked at him. Her eyes were fixed stones.

Then he remembers, The afternoon that we invented the game was as orange as this one.

Suddenly, he is struck by an epiphany. Visions of endless afternoons stretch infront of him like lazy cats. He remembers a man's voice. A dial tone. A strange green notebook that he has never seen before, locked in her desk drawer.

He whispers, It is not a memory. It is not a memory. It is not a memory.

It is only then that she looks away.

what to do when you are left behind

The best thing to do, in most cases,
is to stay exactly where they left you.
It would be a travesty if you went out of your way to go looking for them
for they might not be in any of the places you imagine them to be. Just remember
to stay close to the sidewalk
else you might be pulled in by crowds of lonely faces and you'll lose whatever is left of yourself.
It is also important that you check
how you look from time to time.
You should know that you are not expected to change
into any other form , size, or color. There are so many things about you that
should remain as they were - your complexion, the soft whispering gestures of your hands,
the light tilt in your laughter.
Avoid talking to strangers. Some may like you and convince you to believe that
you don't have to stay where you are
for there are new salvations everywhere, everyday
selling like hotcakes on street corners
but you don't want to go through the agonizing process of coming and leaving.
You tell yourself that it's a different hunger this time so you'd rather wait it
out. If you can, you should avoid looking at watches owned by passersby. To you, time should be
as irrelevant myth. When you get lonely, you can twiddle your thumbs. Or you can talk to yourself. It would be
wonderful if you have managed to bring a book with you. Just remain still.
Wait.
And when they, by a trick of memory, remember their leaving
and decide to return,
You will relish the look on their faces when you say,
Look, I am as unchanged as dusk.

Books!

Something that I got from LN’s blog. I have never even heard of some of the books listed here. I don’t know if the book titles or the names of the authors of these alleged books are even spelled correctly (some seem very, very dubious to me). As you go along, you will notice/learn that:

a. I am a Dahl fan
b. I was a precocious child.
c. I prefer classic literature.
d. I do not want to have anything to do with The Lord of the Rings, Harry Pothead and His Current Mishap, nor the Series of Unfortunate (But Very Predictable) Events.
e. That I absolutely hated The Horse Whisperer.


Rules:

- Highlight the books you have read
- Italicize the books you read as a child.
- Underline the books you intend to read
- Strike the books you hated so much you couldn't finish them
- Add three


1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials Trilogy, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. 1984, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights- Emily Bronte
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Sorcerers Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck (about to)
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens (about to)
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd,Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Susskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho (YECH. The most overrated piece of gibberish I have ever read.)
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez (another mistake)
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot (right)
100. Midnights Children, Salman Rushdie
101. Three Men In A Boat, Jerome K. Jerome
102. Small Gods, Terry Pratchett
103. The Beach, Alex Garland
104. Dracula, Bram Stoker
105. Point Blanc, Anthony Horowitz
106. The Pickwick Papers, Charles Dickens
107. Stormbreaker, Anthony Horowitz
108. The Wasp Factory, Iain Banks
109. The Day Of The Jackal, Frederick Forsyth
110. The Illustrated Mum, Jacqueline Wilson
111. Jude The Obscure, Thomas Hardy
112. The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole Aged 13 1/2, Sue Townsend
113. The Cruel Sea, Nicholas Monsarrat
114. Les Miserables, Victor Hugo
115. The Mayor Of Casterbridge, Thomas Hardy
116. The Dare Game, Jacqueline Wilson
117. Bad Girls, Jacqueline Wilson
118. The Picture Of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
119. Shogun, James Clavell
120.The Day Of The Triffids, John Wyndham
121. Lola Rose, Jacqueline Wilson
122. Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray
123. The Forsyte Saga, John Galsworthy
124. House Of Leaves, Mark Z. Danielewski
125. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
126. Reaper Man, Terry Pratchett
127. Angus, Thongs And Full-Frontal Snogging, Louise Rennison
128. The Hound Of The Baskervilles, Arthur Conan Doyle
129. Possession, A. S. Byatt
130. The Master And Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov
131. The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
132. Danny The Champion Of The World, Roald Dahl
133. East Of Eden, John Steinbeck
134. George's Marvellous Medicine, Roald Dahl
135. Wyrd Sisters, Terry Pratchett
136. The Color Purple, Alice Walker
137. Hogfather, Terry Pratchett
138. The Thirty-Nine Steps, John Buchan
139. Girls In Tears, Jacqueline Wilson
140. Sleepovers, Jacqueline Wilson
141. All Quiet On The Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque
142. Behind The Scenes At The Museum, Kate Atkinson
143. High Fidelity, Nick Hornby
144. It, Stephen King
145. James And The Giant Peach, Roald Dahl
146. The Green Mile, Stephen King
147. Papillon, Henri Charriere
148. Men At Arms, Terry Pratchett
149. Master And Commander, Patrick Obrian
150. Skeleton Key, Anthony Horowitz
151. Soul Music, Terry Pratchett
152. Thief Of Time, Terry Pratchett
153. The Fifth Elephant, Terry Pratchett
154. Atonement, Ian McEwan
155. Secrets, Jacqueline Wilson
156. The Silver Sword, Ian Serraillier
157. One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest, Ken Kesey
158. Heart Of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
159. Kim, Rudyard Kipling
160. Cross Stitch (aka Outlander in the U.S.), Diana Gabaldon
161. Moby Dick, Herman Melville
162. River God, Wilbur Smith
163. Sunset Song, Lewis Grassic Gibbon
164. The Shipping News, Annie Proulx (Jek says this is good)
165. The World According To Garp, John Irving
166. Lorna Doone, R. D. Blackmore
167. Girls Out Late, Jacqueline Wilson
168. The Far Pavilions, M. M. Kaye
169. The Witches, Roald Dahl
170. Charlotte's Web, E. B. White
171. Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
172. They Used To Play On Grass, Terry Venables and Gordon Williams
173. The Old Man And The Sea, Ernest Hemingway
174. The Name Of The Rose, Umberto Eco
175. Sophie's World, Jostein Gaarder
176. Dustbin Baby, Jacqueline Wilson
177. Fantastic Mr. Fox, Roald Dahl
178. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
179. Jonathan Livingstone Seagull, Richard Bach
180. The Little Prince, Antoine De Saint-Exupery
181. The Suitcase Kid, Jacqueline Wilson
182. Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens
183. The Power Of One, Bryce Courtenay
184. Silas Marner, George Eliot
185. American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis
186. The Diary Of A Nobody, George and Weedon Gross-Smith
187. Trainspotting, Irvine Welsh
188. Goosebumps, R. L. Stine (which issue, I wonder?)
189. Heidi, Johanna Spyri
190. Sons And Lovers, D. H. Lawrence
191. The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera
192. Man And Boy, Tony Parsons
193. The Truth, Terry Pratchett
194. The War Of The Worlds, H. G. Wells
195. The Horse Whisperer, Nicholas Evans (The WORST book I’ve ever read.)
196. A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry
197. Witches Abroad, Terry Pratchett
198. The Once And Future King, T. H. White
199. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Eric Carle
200. Flowers In The Attic, Virginia Andrews
201. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
202. The Eye of the World, Robert Jordan
203. The Great Hunt, Robert Jordan
204. The Dragon Reborn, Robert Jordan
205. Fires of Heaven, Robert Jordan
206. Lord of Chaos, Robert Jordan
207. A Crown of Swords, Robert Jordan
208. Winters Heart, Robert Jordan
209. Crossroads of Twilight, Robert Jordan
210. A Path of Daggers, Robert Jordan
211. As Nature Made Him, John Colapinto
212. Microserfs, Douglas Coupland
213. The Married Man, Edmund White
214. Winter's Tale, Mark Helprin
215. The History of Sexuality, Michel Foucault
216. Cry to Heaven, Anne Rice
217. Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe, John Boswell
218. Equus, Peter Shaffer
219. The Man Who Ate Everything, Jeffrey Steingarten
220. Letters To A Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke
221. Ella Minnow Pea, Mark Dunn
222. The Vampire Lestat, Anne Rice
223. Anthem, Ayn Rand
224. The Bridge To Terabithia, Katherine Paterson
225. Tartuffe, Moliere
226. The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka
227. The Crucible, Arthur Miller
228. The Trial, Franz Kafka
229. Oedipus Rex, Sophocles
230. Oedipus at Colonus, Sophocles
231. Death Be Not Proud, John Gunther
32. A Doll's House, Henrik Ibsen
233. Hedda Gabler, Henrik Ibsen
234. Ethan Frome, Edith Wharton
235. A Raisin In The Sun, Lorraine Hansberry
236. ALIVE!, Piers Paul Read
237. Grapefruit, Yoko Ono (hmmm…)
238. Trickster Makes This World, Lewis Hyde
239. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
240. Chronicles of Thomas Convenant, Unbeliever, Stephen Donaldson
241. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
242. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon
243. Summerland, Michael Chabon
244. A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole
245. Candide, Voltaire
246. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More, Roald Dahl
247. Ringworld, Larry Niven
248. The King Must Die, Mary Renault
249. Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein
250. A Wrinkle in Time, Madeline L'Engle
251. The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fforde
252. The House Of The Seven Gables, Nathaniel Hawthorne
253. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
254. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan
255. The Great Gilly Hopkins, Katherine Paterson
256. Chocolate Fever, Robert Kimmel Smith
265. Little House on the Prairie, Laura Ingalls Wilder
267. Where The Red Fern Grows, Wilson Rawls
268. Griffin & Sabine, Nick Bantock
269. Witch of Blackbird Pond, Joyce Friedland
270. Mrs. Frisby And The Rats Of NIMH, Robert C. O'Brien
271. Tuck Everlasting, Natalie Babbitt
272. The Cay, Theodore Taylor
273. From The Mixed-Up Files Of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, E.L. Konigsburg
274. The Phantom Tollbooth, Norton Juster
275. The Westing Game, Ellen Raskin
276. The Kitchen God's Wife, Amy Tan
277. The Bone Setter's Daughter, Amy Tan
278. Relic, Duglas Preston & Lincolon Child
279. Wicked, Gregory Maguire
280. American Gods, Neil Gaiman
281. Misty of Chincoteague, Marguerite Henry
282. The Girl Next Door, Jack Ketchum
283. Haunted, Judith St. George
284. Singularity, William Sleator
285. A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson
286. Different Seasons, Stephen King
287. Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk
288. About a Boy, Nick Hornby
289. The Bookmans Wake, John Dunning
290. The Church of Dead Girls, Stephen Dobyns
291. Illusions, Richard Bach
292. Magic's Pawn, Mercedes Lackey
293. Magic's Promise, Mercedes Lackey
294. Magic's Price, Mercedes Lackey
295. The Dancing Wu Li Masters, Gary Zukav
296. Spirits of Flux and Anchor, Jack L. Chalker
297. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
298. The Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices, Brenda Love
299. Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace
300. The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison
301. The Cider House Rules, John Irving
302. Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
303. Girlfriend in a Coma, Douglas Coupland
304. The Lion's Game, Nelson Demille
305. The Sun, The Moon, and the Stars, Stephen Brust
306. Cyteen, C. J. Cherryh
307. Foucaults Pendulum, Umberto Eco
308. Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson
309. Invisible Monsters, Chuck Palahniuk
310. Camber of Culdi, Kathryn Kurtz
311. The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand
312. War and Rememberance, Herman Wouk
313. The Art of War, Sun Tzu
314. The Giver, Lois Lowry
315. The Telling, Ursula Le Guin
316. Xenogenesis (or Liliths Brood), Octavia Butler
317. A Civil Campaign, Lois McMaster Bujold
318. The Curse of Chalion, Lois McMaster Bujold
319. The Aeneid, Publius Vergilius Maro
320. Hanta Yo, Ruth Beebe Hill
321. The Princess Bride, S. Morganstern (or William Goldman)
322. Beowulf, Anonymous
323. The Sparrow, Maria Doria Russell
324. Deerskin, Robin McKinley
325. Dragonsong, Anne McCaffrey
326. Passage, Connie Willis
327. Otherland, Tad Williams
328. Tigana, Guy Gavriel Kay
329. Number the Stars, Lois Lowry
330. Beloved, Toni Morrison
331. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, Christopher Moore
332. The Mysterious Disappearance of Leon, I mean Noel, Ellen Raskin
333. Summer Sisters, Judy Blume
334. The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Victor Hugo
335. The Island on Bird Street, URI Orlev
336. Midnight in the Dollhouse, Marjorie Filley Stover
337. The Miracle Worker, William Gibson
338. The Genesis Code, John Case
339. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson
340. Paradise Lost, John Milton
341. Phantom, Susan Kay
342. The Mummy or Ramses the Damned, Anne Rice
343. Anno Dracula, Kim Newman
344: The Dresden Files: Grave Peril, Jim Butcher
345: Tokyo Suckerpunch, Issac Adamson
346: The Winter of Magics Return, Pamela Service
347: The Oddkins, Dean R. Koontz
348. My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok
349. The Last Goodbye, Raymond Chandler
350. At Swim, Two Boys, Jaime ONeill
351. Othello, by William Shakespeare
352. The Collected Poems of Dylan Thomas
353. The Collected Poems of William Butler Yeats
354. Sati, Christopher Pike
355. The Inferno, Dante
356. The Apology, Plato
357. The Small Rain, Madeline L'Engle
358. The Man Who Tasted Shapes, Richard E Cytowick
359. 5 Novels, Daniel Pinkwater
360. The Sevenwaters Trilogy, Juliet Marillier
361. Girl with a Pearl Earring, Tracy Chevalier
362. To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf
363. Our Town, Thorton Wilder
364. Green Grass Running Water, Thomas King
335. The Interpreter, Suzanne Glass
336. The Moor's Last Sigh, Salman Rushdie
337. The Mother Tongue, Bill Bryson
338. A Passage to India, E.M. Forster
339. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Stephen Chbosky
340. The Phantom of the Opera
341. Pages for You, Sylvia Brownrigg
342. The Changeover, Margaret Mahy
343. Howl's Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones
344. Angels and Demons, Dan Brown
345. Johnny Got His Gun, Dalton Trumbo
346. Shosha, Isaac Bashevis Singer
347. Travels With Charley, John Steinbeck
348. The Diving-Bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby
349. The Lunatic at Large by J. Storer Clouston
350. Time for Bed by David Baddiel
351. Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold
352. Quite Ugly One Morning by Christopher Brookmyre
353. The Bloody Sun by Marion Zimmer Bradley
354. Sewer, Gas, and Eletric by Matt Ruff
355. Jhereg by Steven Brust
356. So You Want To Be A Wizard by Diane Duane
357. Perdido Street Station, China Mieville
358. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Bronte
359. Road-side Dog, Czeslaw Milosz
360. The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje
361. Neuromancer, William Gibson
362. The Epistemology of the Closet, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
363. A Canticle for Liebowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr
364. The Mask of Apollo, Mary Renault
365. The Gunslinger, Stephen King
366. Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare
367. Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
368. Season of Mists, Neil Gaiman
369. Ivanhoe, Walter Scott
370. The God Boy, Ian Cross
371. The Beekeeper's Apprentice, Laurie R. King
372. Finn Family Moomintroll, Tove Jansson
373. Misery, Stephen King
374. Tipping the Velvet, Sarah Waters
375. Hood, Emma Donoghue
376. The Land of Spices, Kate O'Brien
377. The Diary of Anne Frank
378. Regeneration, Pat Barker
379. Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
380. Dreaming in Cuban, Cristina Garcia
381. A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
382. The View from Saturday, E.L. Konigsburg
383. Dealing with Dragons, Patricia Wrede
384. Eats, Shoots & Leaves, Lynne Truss
385. A Severed Wasp - Madeleine L'Eengle
386. Here Be Dragons - Sharon Kay Penman
387. The Mabinogion (Ancient Welsh Tales) - translated by Lady Charlotte E. Guest
388. The DaVinci Code - Dan Brown
389. Desire of the Everlasting Hills - Thomas Cahill
390. The Cloister Walk - Kathleen Norris
391. The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien
392. I Know This Much Is True, Wally Lamb
393. Choke, Chuck Palahniuk
394. Ender's Shadow, Orson Scott Card
395. The Memory of Earth, Orson Scott Card
396. The Iron Tower, Dennis L. McKiernen
397. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
398. A Ring of Endless Light, Madeline L'Engle
399. Lords of Discipline, Pat Conroy
400. Hyperion, Dan Simmons
401. If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things, Jon McGregor
402. The Bridge, Iain Banks
403. How to Be Good, Nick Hornby
404. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields
405. A Map of the World, Jane Hamilton
406. Eragon, Christopher Paolini One page in and I knew it sucked.
407. A Series of Unfortunate Events, Lemony Snicket
408. Lullaby, Chuck Palahniuk
409. Veronika Decides to Die, Paulo Coelho (blech)
410. White Oleander, Janet Fitch
411. The Land of Laughs, Jonathan Carroll
412. Forrest Gump
413. Roots, Alex Haley
414. Kleopatra, Karen Essex
415. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, Gregory Maguire
416. The Psycho-Ex Game, Merrill Markoe, Andy Prieboy
417. Digital Fortress, Dan Brown
418. Deception Point, Dan Brown
419. Bookends, Jane Green
420. Little Men, Louisa May Alcott
421. Vectors, Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell
422. Redwall, Brian Jacques
423. Millennium, Felipe Fernàndez-Armesto
424. Disgrace, J.M.Coetzee
425. Shardik, Richard Adams
426. Tehanu, Ursula Le Guin
427. Z - A Love Story, Vigdis Grimsdottir
428. Diary, Chuck Palahniuk
429. Don Quixote I, Cervantes
430. Season in hell, Arthur Rimbaud
431. Collected poems, Anna Akhmatova
432. Breath, eyes, memory, Edwidge Danticat
433. The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie
434. The Gospel According to Jesus Christ, José Saramago
435. Not Before Sundown (or Troll - A Love Story), Johanna Sinisalo
436. Hannibal, Thomas Harris
437. The Iron Dragon's Daughter, Michael Swanwick
438. A Game of Thrones, George R.R. Martin
439. The Ballad of Reading Gaol, Oscar Wilde
440. The Universe in a Nutshell, Stephen Hawking
441. Complicity, Iain Banks
442. Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro
443. The Bane Of The Black Sword, Micheal Moorcock
444. Angela's Ashes, Frank McCourt
445. Delta Of Venus, Anais Nin
446. Lost souls, Poppy Z Brite
447. Belle de jour diary of a london call girl -
448. Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman
449. City, Alessandro Baricco
450. Hippopotamus, Stephen Fry
451. Thank you, Jeeves, PG Wodehouse (ooh… I love wodehouse!)
452. Tout à l'Ego (Everything for Ego), Tonino Benacquista
453. Betty Blue, Philippe Djian
454. Naive.Super, Erlend Loe
455. Everything is Illuminated, Jonathan Safran Foer
456. Faust, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
457. Krabat, Otfried Preußler
458. Lieutenant Hornblower, C. S. Forester
459. The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde
460. Drawing Blood, Poppy Z. Brite
461. Lady Chatterley's Lover, D. H. Lawrence
462. The Bounty, Caroline Alexander
463. The Matarese Circle, by Robert Ludlum
464. Coraline, by Neil Gaiman
465. Searching for Dragons, Patricia C Wrede
466. The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul, Douglas Adams
467. The Flanders Panel Arturo Pérez-Reverte
468. This Alien Shore, C. S. Friedman
469. Beauty , Robin McKinley
470. The Eight, Katherine Neville
471. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, J.K. Rowling
472. In this House of Brede, Rumer Godden
473. The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis
474. Reginald, H.H. Munro (Saki)
475. Queen Lucia, E.F. Benson
476. A Shadow On The Glass, Ian Irvine
477. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro
478. Obernewtyn, Isobelle Carmody
479. The Ancient Future, Traci Harding
480. The Surgeon, Tess Gerritse
481. Blindness, Jose Saramago
482. The Quiet American, Graham Greene
483. Portrait in Sepia, Isabelle Allende
484. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides
485. I, Claudius, Robert Graves
486. A Clash of Kings, George R. R. Martin
487. Sammy's Hill, Kristin Gore
488. The Ordinary Princess, M.M. Kaye
489. To Say Nothing of the Dog, Connie Willis
490. Miss Manners Rescues Civilization, Judith Martin
491. Mythology, Edith Hamilton
492. Danse Macabre, Stephen King
493. The Scarlet Pimpernel, Baroness Orczy
494. The Whale Rider, Witi Ihimaera
495. Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine
496. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne
497. The Metemorphoses, Ovid
496. Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Edge of Victory I: Conquest, Greg Keyes
497. American Pastoral, Philip Roth
498. This Side of Paradise, F. Scott Fitzgerald
499. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce
500. Going After Cacciato, Tim O'Brien
501. Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot (and Other Observations), Al Franken
502. The Kalevala, assembled by Elias Lönnrot
503. New Treasure Seekers, E. Nesbit
504. Caramelo, Sandra Cisneros
505. Morality for Beautiful Girls, Alexander McCall Smith
506. Norwegian Wood, Haruki Murakami
507. Schwarz's Principles of Surgery
508. Written on the Body, Jeanette Winterson
509. The Rules of Attraction - Bret Easton Ellis
510. Shanghai Baby - Wei Hui
511. The Virgin Suicides - Jeffrey Eugenides
512. If on a winter's night a traveller - Italo Calvino
513. Lighthousekeeping - Jeanette Winterson
514. Case Histories - Kate Atkinson
515. The Last Camel Died at Noon--Elizabeth Peters
516. He Shall Thunder in the Sky--Elizabeth Peters
517. The Ape that Guards the Balance--Elizabeth Peters
518. White Teeth- Zadie Smith
519. Animal Dreams- Barbara Kingsolver
516. Henry and June- Anais Nin

Mirrors

She likes seeing herself through different mirrors. Their curiously mishandled variations of her intrigue her, at best. But when she finds herself alone during random afternoons, their residual claims make her feel enslaved in moronic patterns.

There were mirrors that told her outright that she was fat. There were days that she preferred that kind of honesty rather than the recurrent limbo of indulgent euphemisms. But there are moments when she would like to be drowned, face first, in flattery and there are mirrors that oblige her.

There were mirrors that left her desolate. Some made her feel like a deity in days of rain. But she avoided these mirrors-the ones that made her irrationaly happy. She never knew where their kisses would lead her. If they would even lead her somewhere.

She used to settle for mirrors that eradicated her sense of self for she sometimes got tired of living alone. She let them mold her, let them pull her into automatic delusions (she was a gypsy princess, a fairy, a miasma of unrequited emotions). She liked laughing a lot during those days and basked in the freedom of reinvention. She pranced and preened in front of these mirrors while trying out different personalities. But at the end of these half-shadowed days, she would disrobe slowly. She shed off skin after luxurious skin for hours at a time. She knows that they do not appreciate the spontaneity of revelation.

What she likes best are the ones that reflect her accurately. Her minute details do not bother them. And because they are rare, she always tries to stand as close to them as possible. She hopes that they would tell her the secret of beginnings- clue her in about something newer and more tangible than regret. But because she stands too close, her reflection fogs up. In minutes, she is as blurry as a distant memory. As dismissible as old photographs.

Sometimes, when she clutches these mirrors too eagerly, they break and shatter and all of a sudden, she finds herself in irredeemable bits and pieces, as lost as the sky.

When this happens, she merely stands up and brushes off remnants that may be stuck in her hair, on her dress. She doesn’t want to leave any traces of past misfortunes. It is not because she is unfeeling, nor can the forgetting be owed to false coyness. She believes that this is the only way she can remember who she was before all this. The only way she can relearn happiness.

To passersby, she makes a pretty picture, standing alone by the doorway. The afternoon sunlight is the only adornment that she needs. It casually flickers and flutters on her face, giving her skin an almost luminous quality that is almost akin to a child’s. If not for the slight crease on her forehead, she could be mistaken for a student from the nearby university.

She does not notice the friendly stares that the afternoon strollers give her. Her eyes, which are usually intensely animated, are now solemn. They are fixed on the piece of paper that she is holding. She has actually finished reading the contents of the letter. She turns it slowly in her hands then folds it. After a few moments, she decides to unfold it. She reads a few lines out loud, as if she were reading to a child.

The letter is slightly creased, which made her initially think that it was written recently. She reads the date written in ardent loops next to his signature. It was written a year ago- March 25, 2004.

She remembers that day. Not the details, surely, for her memories usually have a way of losing themselves in her mundane concerns. But she remembers that that was the first time she ever saw this house.

She puts the paper close to her nose and sniffs. She tries to guess what the scent was. Apples? Strawberries? Of course the scent is not hers. She was never partial to fruity smells.

But it really doesn’t matter now. How it smells, when it was written, who it was for. He used to chide her for her penchant for curios. Her mother used to say that her hankering for mysteries would be her own undoing.

Let things lie, her mother said. Don’t go looking under rocks if you’re afraid of the dark things that lurk beneath them.

What is she here for, if not to learn? she used to retort, because she was sassier then.

What good would learning do if it would break you? her mother says.

Pain is something that you can never unlearn said her father.You open that box, you face the music.

I opened this box, I’ll face the music, she now whispers to herself.

Some sentences in the letter are familiar. When she read them for the first time, she could not help but remember his beautiful mouth whispering them, as if they were incantations. They were whispered to her. She tries to assess how she feels about being the recipient of rehashed compliments. She suddenly feels the heaviness of her weightlessness.

It is indeed a letter of love. But it obviously wasn’t for her. She did not meet him at the museum that day. She says the date aloud and marvels at the unfamiliarity of the words. Nor did she remember sitting on a pavement a couple of months before the museum visit, sharing thoughts about life while smoking. It is not their seventh year of writing to one another.

It amazes her now, this calmness. She acknowledges the fact that she has seen this coming. Intimacy is, again, just an old piece of twine haphazardly tying the boat she has been sitting on to a rickety pier. It’s one of those circumstances that completely drowns you out with a curious hopelessness.

She arranges the thoughts in her head, like she would daisies on their breakfast table. She chooses the memories she would like to weed out but she realizes it isn’t that easy. She wonders which of those memories really happened. Maybe she has dreamed him up all along. I may have been alone in this house for years and I never even knew it.

She begins to ask herself if he is really coming home. If this was home. Four-letter words are the most ambiguous ones, she thinks. Maybe this was just a halfway house where they were both stuck in because they lost track of all the road signs and didn’t know which direction to push forward to.

She hears a dog barking and this unexpected intrusion breaks her concentration. She looks around and suddenly realizes how bright the world seems, even at four in the afternoon. She observes the people chatting as they pass by her door. No one seems to notice how much she has changed. How light she now feels.

She turns around and shuts the door. She will fix dinner while waiting for him.

----------------------

Yes, this is a draft.

I hate sounding mediocre. Still, I decided to publish this so that I can remember to tweak it.

I dood it

How to make things worse:

1. Mope.
2. Sulk.
3. Abuse Internet rights and post a lame survey.

Lame survey:

(x) snuck out of the house
(x) gotten lost in your city
(x) seen a shooting star
(x) been to any other countries besides the united states
( ) had a serious surgery
(x) gone out in public in your pajamas
(x) kissed a stranger
(x) hugged a stranger
( ) been in a fist fight
(x) been arrested
( ) done drugs
(x) had alcohol
( ) laughed and had milk/coke come out of your nose
(x) pushed all the buttons on an elevator
(x) swore at your parents
(x) been in love
(x) been close to love
( ) been to a casino
( ) been skydiving
( ) broken a bone
(x) been high
(x) skinny-dipped
(x) skipped school
( ) flashed someone
(x) saw a therapist
(x) played spin the bottle
( ) gotten stitches
( ) drank a whole gallon of milk in one hour
(x) bitten someone
( ) been to Niagara Falls
(x) gotten the chicken pox
(x) kissed a member of the opposite sex
( ) kissed a member of the same sex
(x) crashed into a friend's car
( ) been to Japan
(x) ridden in a taxi
(x) been dumped
(x) shoplifted
( ) been fired
(x) had a crush on someone of the same sex
(X) had feelings for someone who didnt have them back
(x) stolen something from your job
(x) gone on a blind date
(x) lied to a friend
(x) had a crush on a teacher
( ) celebrated mardi-gras in new orleans
( ) been to Europe
( ) slept with a co-worker
( ) been married
( ) gotten divorced
( ) had children
(x) seen someone die
(x) had a close friend die
( ) been to Africa
( ) Driven over 400 miles in one day
( ) Been to Canada
( ) Been to Mexico
(x) Been on a plane
( ) Seen the Rocky Horror Picture Show
(x) Thrown up in a bar
(x) Purposely set a part of myself on fire
(x) Eaten Sushi
( ) Been snowboarding
(x) Met someone in person from the internet
( ) lost a child
(x) gone to college
(x) graduated college
( ) done hard drugs
( ) tried killing yourself
( ) fired a gun
(x) purposely hurt yourself
(x) taken painkillers
(x) love someone or miss someone right now

impossible things

Such a wreck today. Glad it's all almost over.

This made me feel better, though. Thank you...

http://006.tenkuu.net/i-t2/index.html

...

this will never end, will it?

Listen

I’ve been let down
And I still come ‘round
I’ve been put down
And I’m still comin’ round for you
Comin’ round for you.

Take away everything that feels fine
Catch a shape in the circles of my mind
Make me feel like I belong to you
Make me feel, even if it ain’t true

Catch a train on a silver afternoon
A thousand miles and I’m getting there too soon.
Take me there when I should be going home.
Tell me why I'm still feelin’ all alone.

I’ve been let down
And I’m still coming round
I’ve been put down
And I’m still comin’ round for you
Comin’ round for you- Mazzy Star, I've Been Let Down

isn't life just dandy?

'Round Here

There is truly no other place I would rather be.

70's Bistro

Last Friday, I had my first Bistro experience.

And what an experience it turned out to be.

I was so proud.:-)

Perhaps I will always be
Only this:

Five and pregnant
With a cavernous, private hunger
While someone sleeps in dark corners,
Creating angels out of accidental molehills.

Atwood Poems

Bored

All those times I was bored
out of my mind. Holding the log
while he sawed it. Holding
the string while he measured, boards,
distances between things, or pounded
stakes into the ground for rows and rows
of lettuces and beets, which I then (bored)
weeded. Or sat in the back
of the car, or sat still in boats,
sat, sat, while at the prow, stern, wheel
he drove, steered, paddled. It
wasn't even boredom, it was looking,
looking hard and up close at the small
details. Myopia. The worn gunwales,
the intricate twill of the seat
cover. The acid crumbs of loam, the granular
pink rock, its igneous veins, the sea-fans
of dry moss, the blackish and then the graying
bristles on the back of his neck.
Sometimes he would whistle, sometimes
I would. The boring rhythm of doing
things over and over, carrying
the wood, drying
the dishes. Such minutiae. It's what
the animals spend most of their time at,
ferrying the sand, grain by grain, from their tunnels,
shuffling the leaves in their burrows. He pointed
such things out, and I would look
at the whorled texture of his square finger, earth under
the nail. Why do I remember it as sunnier
all the time then, although it more often
rained, and more birdsong?
I could hardly wait to get
the hell out of there to
anywhere else. Perhaps though
boredom is happier. It is for dogs or
groundhogs. Now I wouldn't be bored.
Now I would know too much.
Now I would know.


A Sad Child

You're sad because you're sad.
It's psychic.
It's the age.
It's chemical.
Go see a shrink or take a pill,
or hug your sadness like an eyeless doll
you need to sleep.
Well, all children are sad
but some get over it.
Count your blessings.
Better than that,
buy a hat.
Buy a coat or pet.
Take up dancing to forget.
Forget what?
Your sadness,
your shadow,
whatever it was that was done to you
the day of the lawn party
when you came inside flushed with the sun,
your mouth sulky with sugar,
in your new dress with the ribbon
and the ice-cream smear,
and said to yourself in the bathroom,
I am not the favorite child.
My darling, when it comes
right down to it
and the light fails and the fog rolls in
and you're trapped in your overturned body
under a blanket or burning car,
and the red flame is seeping out of you
and igniting the tarmac beside you head
or else the floor,
or else the pillow,
none of us is;
or else we all are.

The Moment

The moment when,
after many years
of hard work and a long voyage
you stand in the centre of your room,
house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,
knowing at last how you got there,
and say, I own this,
is the same moment when the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,
the cliffs fissure and collapse,
the air moves back from you like a wave
and you can't breathe.
No, they whisper.
You own nothing.
You were a visitor,
time after time
climbing the hill,
planting the flag,
proclaiming.
We never belonged to you.
You never found us.


I actually wish that I could produce something better than these poems.
My insanity knows no bounds.

Poor Fellows- Neruda

What it takes on this planet,
to make love to each other in peace.
Everyone pries under your sheets,
everyone interferes with your loving.
They say terrible things about a man and a woman,
who after much milling about,
all sorts of compunctions,
do something unique,
they both lie with each other in one bed.
I ask myself whether frogs are so furtive,
or sneeze as they please.
Whether they whisper to each other in swamps about illegitimate frogs,
or the joys of amphibious living.
I ask myself if birds single out enemy birds,
or bulls gossip with bullocks before they go out in public with cows.
Even the roads have eyes and the parks their police.
Hotels spy on their guests,
windows name names,
canons and squadrons debark on missions to liquidate love.
All those ears and those jaws working incessantly,
till a man and his girl
have to raise their climax,
full tilt,
on a bicycle.


One of the 6 Neruda poems that I actually like.

Crankiness is a warm gun

Bored and cranky.
Bored and cranky.
Bored and cranky.

So much for snappy mantras.

Here are some quotes that I received through my mail today:

"I would rather live in a world where my life is surrounded by mystery than live in a world so small that my mind could comprehend it." Harry Emerson Fosdick

"Well-behaved women rarely make history." Laurel Thatcher Ulrich (so true)

“The reward for conformity is everyone likes you but yourself.” Rita Mae Brown (understatement)

“Some people walk in the rain, others just get wet.” -Roger Miller (!)

“The fact that no one understands you, doesn’t make you an artist.” - anonymous (take that,clay feet!)

My favorite:

"How vain is it to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live?" Henry David Thoreau (and yes, living is not synonymous to the phrase "roughing it in Europe")

The compliment of the week. No. The compliment of the year

"I can't reconcile the look in your eyes with all the problems that you tell me about. It's amazing how your eyes have retained their innocence. Everytime I see you, I am surpised by that innocence and by your happiness."

Now THAT is a compliment. It's been a while since I have heard the word innocence and my name in the same statement.

Thanks, Amie.

A portrait of Marion Morehouse by ee cummings

Waiting


there is a certain
poignancy in waiting.

moments when you are
poised for flight,
for change,
for the languor
of beginnings
that make you believe ( finally!) in fantastic deaths.

there is a certain wretchedness
in waiting.

seconds when
suddenly, everywhere
you are alone.
and your hands that
were minutes
so lively
now are spent
and quiet,
like fitful birds that
have been shot
by the rancor of
false hope.

there is a certain
timelessness in waiting.

as if you have always been
in this exact spot.
your sighing fists, memory boxes
holding warm stars,
conversations spilling out of tainted mugs,
the broken music
of his voice.

Wastelessness of Time

Demo teach on Monday (I can taste this post in my blood... I want it soooo bad.)

Court hearing on Saturday.

Find a lawyer.

Visit my aunt who was lately diagnosed of breast cancer.

Find some friggin peace.

I wonder how I can still find time to write. But find time, I will. This is the only way I can keep my sanity intact.

Why I Prefer Lorca

I can do without tame poetry-
These ambiguous ghosts, hiding behind rehashed faces of love,
They leave me weak with
Unnecessary longing.
I'd rather poetry
Grab me by the arm and whip me silly.
I'd rather it fill me with a unique rage
Or throttle me with foreign feeling.
I'd prefer wanton abandon to your words-
Peace wrapped in wolves' clothing.

Here's is one of Lorca's poems, The Gypsy and the Wind. Weep and learn!

http://boppin.com/lorca/gypsy.html

To Lalaine, Who Dreams of Going Abroad

An immigrant, she is hesitant
about wandering too far.
She is afraid of the newness of things,
of dangers that lurk in subways,
of the sanity of strangers,
of blinking street lights.
When she reaches a stop,
she reels from the strangeness of foreign ground.
She recovers and wanders around
but she gets lost easily
for she knows the way home
but not what home is.
Only the certainty of her emancipation
Leads her to the promisesof a different sun.
Strange lands are carefully hidden
in her jean pockets.
She likes to take them out occasionally
To criticize their individual flaws-
Too hot.
Too cold.
Too smiley.
Too restless.
When she puts them back,
She wakes upand ties her hair.
She heads straight to the marketplace.
Her hands reek of
dried fish.

Confessions of a Survivor

In the beginning, God didn't just make one or two people, he made a bunch of us. He wanted us to have lots of fun together so he put us all in a playground park thingy that he called Eden and let us do whatever we wanted.

I guess he was just bored, being alone and all.

At first, we did have fun just like he expected. We climbed trees, rolled down hills, swung on vines, swam in rivers, made faces. I remember laughing a lot.

Then one day this snake told us that it'd be more fun if we kept score. We didn't even know what score meant. But when he said that we should give an apple to the person who played best and we wouldn't know who was best unless we kept score, we finally got it. We could all see the fun in that. And we were all sure that we were the best.

Things were different after that. We yelled at each other a lot. We had to make new games and we had to devise scoring rules for each game. We eliminated other activities, like frolicking, because they were hard to score.

When God found out about our new game he was very angry. He said we couldn't use his garden anymore because we weren't having any fun. But we told him that we were having fun but he didn't listen and kicked us out the very next day. He said we couldn't come back until we stopped keeping score. To make us feel guilty about the whole thing, he even told us that we would all die anyway and our scores would mean nothing in the end.

He was wrong. My cumulative all-game score is now 14,782 and that means a lot to me. If I could raise it to 30, 000 before I die, I'll know I've accomplished something. Even if I can't reach this goal, I know that my life would still have a great deal of meaning because I've taught my children to score high and they'll all be able to reach 30,000 or 50,000 I know.

Really, it was life in Eden that was meaningless. Fun is great and all but without scoring, who'd really care about having fun? God has a very superficial view of life and I am glad my children are being raised away from his influence. We were lucky to get out. We're all very grateful to the snake.

If you think this is about you, it probably is.

Do you want to know a secret?