"Until I Find You"

Two things:

1- I finished "Until I Find You". I think a lot about it. I will tell you all about my thoughts shortly.

2-Thursday I will be leaving in the middle of the night for vacation. Me and Kyle, his parents, and the bride and groom will all be driving in one car to Dallas. Our plane leaves Dallas at 6 in the morning or something. Boo-hiss!

Okay, on to the review of "Until I Find You". Let me preface by saying I love John Irving. He can really do no wrong in my eyes. I'm not saying that it was the best book I have ever read, but with Irving there are always elements worth reading.

It reminded me a lot of "The World According to Garp". It could have just as easily been called "The World According to Jack Burns". It starts with the parents and the absent father then we follow Jack into adulthood. Arguably, not as heart wrenching as Garp. But I think that is because the ending didn't have as much resolution.

Some of the plot line or even certain sentences were a little forced. The characters make up for what the book lacks in anything else. Irving knows how to write a character. Plain and simple. He writes these characters that are damaged and flawed and painful and I love them. The more fucked up the character the more I love them.

Over all it was good and I'm happy I read it.

Be on the look out!

Email from UT.

On Wednesday, July 18, 2007 at approximately 1:00 pm, a student was
robbed walking between the Power Plant Extension Building (PPE) and
Applied Computational Engineering Science Building (ACE).  She was
pushed from behind, knocked to the ground and then told to give all of
her property to the suspect.

The suspect is described as follows:
Black male, in his early to mid 20's
Approximately 6' tall, 220 lbs.
Very heavy build, large nose

The suspect was last seen wearing:
Black hooded sweatshirt and burnt orange basketball shorts Anyone
having
information regarding this robbery should contact The University of
Texas at Austin Police Department 

Why would you need to give your stuff away because somebody pushed you? I would be so mad I wouldn't be able to give my shit away. I would start cursing and yelling. I mean did he sit on her and threaten to not let her up? Did he threaten to punch her? And did you notice the "large nose" things. Could that be more offensive?

Conversation on the couch

Kyle: We should start packing tonight.
Lauren: Let's just through all of stuff away.
Kyle: No.
Lauren: Why not?
Kyle: That would be wasteful.
Lauren: Well, we will give it all to goodwill.
Kyle: Then what? Buy new stuff?
Lauren: No. We'll just live in an empty house.

I'm moving

As soon as we get back from vacation Kyle and I are moving. I'm having mixed feelings about the whole thing.

One one hand, I will be living in Austin, north Austin, but Austin never the less. I will be able to ride my bike to the library. Very cool. I will be able to ride the bus the very short distance to the grocery store. Tons of hike and bike trails. Fry's is like three blocks away. In short, very convenient.

On the other hand, I have to move. Just thinking about it is sucking. Packing, painting, cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. Since both houses belong to Kyle's parents there is no leave and let somebody else clean it for you. We will be doing all the cleaning. Not only will we have to clean the house we are going to move into, but are house that we live in right now, and another rent house in our neighborhood. It will be a lot of work. I don't know if you know this, but cleaning up after other people is the grossest thing on the face of the earth.

Bachelorette Party

I told you that Kyle's little sister is getting married. We leave for St. Thomas next Thursday late at night. We have to be at the Dallas airport at 6 in the morning. I can't remember a time when I took a flight I haven't pulled an all-nighter the night before. This really is not good. I don't recommend it.

This Saturday I get to go to a bachelorette party with eight 20 somethings I don't know. Who, I'm sure, are decidedly girlie. Not to mention the fact I don't think there was ever a time I went out with more than say 2 girls. I can remember going out with a large amount of guys, but not women. I'm quite worried. I'm trying to think positive, but this is going to be dreadful. I can feel it.

What will I say? I'm horrible with these things. I'm horrible with women. They won't want to talk about books. I will guarantee you that. My life is pretty much consumed with books and independent film. Nobody reads and nobody watches independent movies. I'm such a bore.

I think my solution will be to smoke massive amounts of pot before hand. Then I just won't give a shit. This sounds like a good plan to me. Maybe not.

Gift Solutions

Friday I drove Kyle's grandmother (his dad's mom) to go shopping. She is too scared to drive in Austin. She didn't want Kyle to take her because he is a boy and everyone knows boys don't like to shop. So I was the lucky girl. Never mind the fact that she has two female granddaughters. One of which is Kyle's sister. So I take Meemaw to this store. Then we go have lunch.

While at lunch I manage to make her cry. That's right. I made her cry. She was telling me stories about Kyle's grandfather. Not her husband, but Kyle's mom's dad, I didn't think it was a problem if I asked how he died. It was at least ten years ago. She started to cry. I felt like a huge asshole. I can't even tell you.

So long story short, I get home Kyle asks if we took my car. We did so I say yes. Then he asks if Meemaw gave me any money for gas. Nope. Kyle says, "That Meemaw." Just the day before Kyle had received a $400 check for doing about 2 hours worth of yard work for Meemaw. There is no rhyme or reason for these things. She said, "I help your cousin all the time, and she is so hateful!" Kyle's other cousin is going to medical school so she really does need help and Meemaw calls her fat and monitors what she eats. That would make anyone hateful.

The next day she calls Kyle at work. On Sundays he makes her a pizza and brings it to her after he gets off work. And she had made a blueberry pie for me.

Blueberry Pie! It is so good. Moral of the story: Make old women cry then they bake you pies?

Forward

My mom sent me an email. You know the one that you don't really care about cause you know it is going to be sappy and sentimental and you really don't feel up to it right now. But I read it. A number of life lessons from an unknown author. Some I really enjoyed. Mostly because they are words to live by. They are words I try to live by anyways.

Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.

When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

Frame every so-called disaster with these words: "In five years, will this matter?"

Forgive everyone everything.

What other people think of you is none of your business.

However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful , or joyful.

Tell me what you saw, and I'll tell you what you missed

I have thoughts. Crazy, rambling, beasts of thoughts. I sit quietly as if on a park bench and watch them go by like strangers. Once past I scarcely think of them, these thoughts. But sometimes they frighten me.

-Bukowski, is he a good read? I wonder what is the definitive Bukowski?
-I wonder what I would be like as a mother? Would I freak out about things that I normally wouldn't have out of frustration or some other motherly sort of feeling that I can't help?
-I wonder if Laura will be ok. What is happening to her? What about Iris?
-Wait. Those aren't real people, Lauren.
-I think I'm snapping. Me and the beans.
-If I just started reading again I would find out what is happening to Iris and Laura.
-No, I know where it is going and I don't think I quite like it. I'd rather sit here and make things up.
-Iris isn't going to tell Laura that she has been having an affair and everything will be fine.
-I like Modest Mouse.
-Paul Simon is pretty good too.
-I like musicians who write songs about literature. I don't know that Paul Simon has done this. -I was thinking about Modest Mouse, Led Zeppelin, the like.
-It seems like this is seeping out. Am I talking?
-No.

The Worst Bumper Sticker EVER!

"Planned Parenthood Killing a generation one baby at a time!"

I wanted to ram them into oncoming traffic. That is what I call population control.

Meanwhile, this is on an SUV. It makes me want to hunt them down and make a bumper sticker that says,

"SUV's killing the environment one gas guzzling mile at a time!"

or how about something that said,

"If people like me didn't drive piece of shit SUV's maybe the world would be a better place to live."

Then slash all there tires. This wouldn't really make a statement, but I would feel better about the situation.

In my irrational anger population control and polluting is the same thing. You knock one you better damn well be doing what you can for the other. If not you better get off your fucking high horse. Because the world is over populated. Is there anything worse than judgment through a bumper sticker?
Hypocrisy through a bumper sticker!

I'm done

I am done with my first summer semester at UT. I have five weeks until school starts again and a huge stack of books to get through.

1. The Blind Assassin Margart Atwood
2. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell Susanna Clarke
3. Flannery O'Connor The Complete Stories
4. Until I Find You John Irving
5. The Robber Bride Margaret Atwood

(That doesn't look like much, but a lot of them are quite large.)

I am trying to read more women authors. All my favorite authors are men. I feel wrong for that. Any suggestions?

Anger Management

You know when you see a young person get angry and you have this flash of them in middle age, old and bitter and it so ugly. And you wish you could show them what you saw for that second to save them from what they will become.

I am an angry person. No doubt about it. But in all my angry years I have learned a few things.

#1-Don't ever say anything when you are angry. Bad, bad things slip out and if you are not prepared to live with those things for the rest of your life for God's sake don't speak! You may forget, but I can guarantee you the person that got hurt won't.

Of course no one will listen to #1 so here are some other tips I've picked up along the way.

#2-Don't ever try to rationalize your anger whilst angry. No doubt you will sound like a raving, fucking lunatic.

#3-Never bring up stuff you have previously yelled at somebody for. You look like the biggest asshole in the world cause you can't get over it. If you can't get over it tough shit, that is your deal.

#4- Never bring up stuff that you previously haven't yelled at someone for. This is when things start to turn ugly. When you start making it painfully clear there is a totally different reason for your madness. For God's sake stop talking! It may be okay to be angry about those things, but it isn't okay to bring them up because you are snowballing to rationalize your anger.

#5-Don't through a temper tantrum. Any feet stomping, name calling or flipping the bird is immediate grounds for a visit to the crazy house. Adults aren't supposed to do that. Whoever you are fighting with will dump your ass in a heartbeat. It could be your own mother. She will dump your ass for being a crazy bitch (even if you are a man).

#6- The one place it is okay to talk when angry is in the car. Traffic can't hear and cursing like a sailor helps me feel better.

7#-When your argument is poor or you don't have a comeback, please for the love of God, don't start in with, "Fuck You!" Admit defeat. You don't have a leg to stand on. Your argument is irrational and stop talking. (It is okay, however, to start your argument with fuck you if you aren't yelling and you have a good argument.)

#8- Try not to have outbursts in front of people who haven't seen them before. You will push them away too, even if they aren't the brunt of your anger.

#9-Try not to have outbursts in front of people that have seen you have outbursts before. They will catch on that this is a normal things and want to commit you.

#10- One more time for good measure, Don't Say Anything! Your regret for the way you acted will feed on you for the rest of your life. This will make you older and bitter faster than your anger will. You will be sorry for the relationships you have ruined and the people you pushed away.

Trust me on this one.

You may have noticed I didn't mention anything about apologizing. Well, you wouldn't have to apologize if you didn't say anything now would you!

Apologies don't work and they sure as hell don't fix things.