(Not) Reading Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Posted by Melissa Baumgart

Me, reading last week's book, and having
some Æbleskiver.
(Although, it has wheat and sugar, so I
didn't actually eat any.)

The New Book-of-the-Week
I feel like I am just reading words.  Like this book is in another language, and words after words keep logging into the spaces of my brain, but not congealing into anything that makes a lick of sense.  Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carré is my third book this month.  After the reading success of my previous two weeks, I am feeling defeated as I am on the 4th day of this book and I have barely read 30 pages.  Maybe, after I get 50 more pages in, it will all start making sense.  That is if I remember any of these words I keep reading and rereading.  A big IF.

The Theme
I love a theme.  I don't know if I was always this way, but I noticed it cropping up when I hosted dinner parties.  If I am making Indian food, then it is all Indian, and as authentic as I can manage.  I love to find some Indian music and perhaps a drink from the country to add to the flavor.  Recently, at our Mother-Daughter book club, the host made Æbleskiver (a Danish donut kind of thing) because the book we read took place in Denmark.  I felt right at home, even thought I am not Danish nor do I think I could ever remember how to pronounce the sweet treat's name.

This is all to say, I created a theme for myself with the books.  I decided to read all books that had been made into movies.  I heard that my friend's teenage daughter scoffed a bit at my "movie" books, wondering if that is all I read.  I do read other books, actually besides one, I don't think I have read any other movie books. (Probably because I have not read many books at all.)  Right now, I wish I had picked any other book than the movie book I have next to my keyboard.

The worst part: it turns out reading books and then going to see the movie almost always sucks.  Jamie and I went to see The Descendants this week.  I was really, really looking forward to it.  We both were, because he had read the book too, and loved it.  Loved the BOOK, let's just be really clear about this.

We did NOT love the movie.  Within the first 30 seconds I was done.  The main character's wife is in a coma, and in the book her name is Joanie.  I grew to really like her name, it fit her personality, and I felt a little like I knew Joanie as they author took you back in time, before the accident.  Well, then there goes Goerge Clooney up on the big screen, playing Matt King, Joanie's husband, and what does he call her?  Elizabeth!  Really?  WTF is wrong with the name Joanie?

Beyond that, there were glaring differences, touching and important scenes left out and poor casting.  The best actor in the whole movie was the grandma that had dementia.  I have heard that people who have not read the book really liked the movie.  I say, good for you.  But I am glad I read the book, even if it meant having to sit through that terrible movie.

I doubt I'll even try to see the movie version of Extremely Loud & Incredible Close.  Even though everyone I know loves it.  After my Descendants experience, I seriously cannot imagine the brilliance of Foer's novel standing up to a screen version.

The Screen Diet
I have been true to my word on the screen diet.  I have seriously cut back on screen time.  I do find it difficult to keep track.  I wonder if there is a screen time version of a pedometer.  Keeping track of every blink of your online steps.  I suppose I could practice statistics by gathering information for my browsing history.  That sounds fun.

The phone is a tempting ground for cheating on my diet.  I have Facebook, email, Twitter...all of it right there letting me know every time something new has occurred.  It is harder to not pretend to myself that it doesn't count to check in real quick on my social media world via my phone.

The phone is always there.  Even in the car.  Just the other day, I *very softly* rear ended someone at a red light after I had looked at the photo on the screen saver for my phone.  I wasn't even doing anything with the phone while actually driving.   But glancing down at it at a red light was enough for me to be distracted, and not realize the person in front of me slammed on their brakes just after the light turned green.

The screen diet has been a catalyst to me making a commitment to not look at my phone in the car.  I am embarrassed to say that it is proving to be difficult.  But perhaps not as difficult as reading Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.  Can't I just rent the TV series from the video store up the street and call it good?

Well, I won;t do that, so wish me good luck in finishing this spy book.  Why in the world did I pick a spy book from the 70's?  I think people who know me are probably wondering the same thing.

-Melissa

Reading Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

Incredibly close to one of my favorite posters, by
Nikki McClure.

Posted by Melissa Baumgart
I just finished reading Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close.  The tears are still wet on my face.  It is a heartbreaking and tender book.  While not always tender, for there are details that stun the mind with pain (if you can even barely let yourself imagine it happening to you or someone you love), the perspective is tender.  And how could it not be, from the eyes of a 9 year old?  An inquisitive, brilliant and creative, thought-full little boy.

The book takes you to many places, which for me, can be a bit confusing as a reader.  I got mad a number of times when I didn't know who was speaking, because the first person tense changes character so often.  But, as I eased into each change and let go of my control over who I was listening to, I fell in love with each and every person in the book.  It's funny though, for as many of those first person changes occurred and as many characters that there were in the book, I would still maintain the book is from the perspective of the little boy, Oskar.

I loved each person in the book because they were all so real.  Sometimes they did things you didn't want them to, and that made them all the more realistic.  Sometimes they didn't do things you really wanted them to.  They were utterly human, trying to run away from pain and all the while, constantly, blindly, running back into pain's open arms.  It seems to always be waiting.  Patiently.  With confidence that you will return.

All that pain and suffering can be depressing.  Or it can be life-affirming.  To witness another's struggle, and feel like you were able to hold that space for them to experience life's pain to the fullest.  To witness the insights and motives and also see... Well, I don't want to ruin it for those of you that are going to read the book.  And you HAVE to read it.  You just have to, it was that good.

It was written so skillfully that it brought me into the lives of the characters, so much so that I felt like I truly did witness their pain.  As I held the plain black covered book in my hands, I also held space for their tears to openly flow, even if they never ended.  I would be there for them.  I think I needed to remind myself at times that these people are fictional, made-up, not real.  Kudos to Jonathan Safran Foer for a job well done.   Brilliant writing.  

One of the characters, in a moment of seamless stream-of-consciousness thoughts, says, "When I looked at you, my life made sense.  Even the bad things made sense.  They were necessary to make you possible."

That's life.

Those are what I like to call "silver lining moments", when from a timely distance you can see why bad things happened.  Although painful at the time, I always hope to be able to look back and know...they were necessary for something greater than myself.

Back to here and now, and my non-fiction life, as it continues on.  Who knows what it will bring.  Yesterday, as I was driving to school on I-5, there was a terrible accident.  A semi-truck overturned and I heard that 8 people were trapped upside down in a car.  I thought about how you never know what your life will bring.  You could be happily, or unhappily for that matter, driving down the interstate, and then BAM.  Crash.  Everything is changed.  You're watching people die next to you, or wondering how long it will take to be rescued from a car that could explode at any moment.  

(Turns out, thankfully, no one died and the 8 people trapped story was untrue.  But it still made me think.)

I made me think of this book.  And life.  And being human.  All these thoughts may change us for a day or an hour, bringing us closer to prioritizing what really matters.  But then the everyday creeps in and have to go to work and pay bills and do dishes, and our habits and patterns of how we avoid pain come flooding back in.

That's life.

And now off to my everyday.  Today brings statistics class and a matinee of "The Descendants."  Maybe after my next book I'll go see "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" on the big screen.  I have to decide within the next two hours what that next book will be.  And get started reading.

-Melissa

I am going on a diet

Oooh, so I see some screens down there?  
Oh well, just books!

Posted by Melissa Baumgart
I am 77 pages away from finishing my book this week.  I had a huge anatomy & physiology exam this morning and I had a hard time studying for it.  I just couldn't seem to engage with the material like I usually do.  I found myself picking up my Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close book instead, completely engaged with every word.

And while I didn't perform to a perfect standard, as I like to do on exams of all sorts, I still think I did OK.  The cool part was that I wasn't stressed or panicked during the exam.  I wasn't hastily scribbling down my answers for fear that if I took too long the information would somehow escape like sands through a broken hourglass.  I was calm and I took my time, thinking through each question and making sure to breathe.  It was a completely different experience.

It may have come from having a calm place to go besides always staring at a screen for entertainment.  I have my book.  It is stimulating in an entirely different way then a screen is.  Screens can create overstimulation for myself.  And the social media aspect, the Facebook and messaging and Pinning and checking to see if anyone repined or liked your identity in the form of a virtual dream collage, creates a state of anticipation that acts like a stress response in the body.

Sure, it is fun for a bit, but prolonged exposure to the stress hormones isn't so great for your body.  I heard a classmate share that when she was teaching high school in Japan, several of her students complained of not being able to sleep because they didn't want to stop texting and Facebooking.  Kids are losing sleep over this?  Because they have to respond to the next message, and the next, and the next?

It all brings me back to a nagging notion that I have has since starting "Read a Book a Week" month.  I need to go on a diet.  A screen diet.  Did I ever tell you that once during game of charades, my 6 year old picked my name, and to act like me she pretended to be sitting at the computer?  If I did tell you already, it's because I felt incredibly guilty after that.  I want to be present to my kids, to my family and friends, not the screen.

I keep resisting it though.  It is such an easy outlet for that thing I wrote about last, procrastination.  But maybe so can a book.  Or cleaning my apartment.  Or being productive in some other way than surfing the web, doing "research" and seeing if any blog readers have popped up from Saudi Arabia this week.  Those stats are so cool, though.  Thanks for reading, whoever you are in Jiddah, Makkah, Saudi Arabia!

So, here it is, another challenge...besides blogging, only 1 hour of screen time per day for the next week.  It may still seem like a lot to some of you, but that is cutting it considerably for me.  I hate to even admit that, but it is true.  I want to create a new habit, and I know that it is possible.  Perhaps difficult, but possible.

My last challenge I gave myself was during January's Healthival festival.  During Healthival, I followed through completely on almost half of the 18 things on my list.  That was pretty good for me, considering the list, and my unintentional aversion to some of the things on it.  This challenge is more simple in some ways, but so pervasive.  And as much as I can look procrastination in the face with a refreshing and nonjudgmental perspective, I can't hide from my inner voice any longer.

(Crap.  I am already thinking.  I do not want to do this.  But I have to.  Must summon English bulldog determination.  Thanks, Bikram!)

And now onto another pressing issue, what book to read next?  Do I stick with the theme I have going of reading Books nominated for Best Picture this year?  Or do I just grab something off my shelf at random?

-Melissa

PS...If you join me on the screen diet, reading Good Luck With That! doesn't count.  It's free screen time. Everything has it's exceptions, right?

  

When procrastination wins over production

Trying to read at a basketball game, didn't really work.

Posted by Melissa Baumgart
Some days are just days.  Nothing much happens, even though there are a million things to do.  Procrastination wins over production, and I feel like I am left with the remnants of undone aspirations of which I have many choices of what I can make of them.  I can be creative, and twist them into a DIY project that makes my life appear more beautiful and shines a rosy light of "Wow, look what she did!" over my wasted day.  Or I can go the opposite direction, and wallow and wade through them like I am the main character on an episode of "Hoarders."

Even on productive days, on love-y sun filled golden days, we still have that choice.  I think that is why some people remain depressed, no matter their external circumstances.  There is a psychology epistemology called Post-Modernism.  In it they propose that we are constantly creating our experience, and that it is through our own mental constructs that we live and breathe.  We can live and breathe a day as a failure or as a success, no matter what happened that day.  What matters, they say, is how we choose to perceive it in the moment in which we are taking each breath.

These are the things I think about after a day filled with nothing much but a little reading in my book.  Yesterday was the kind of day with a long to-do list, and the to-do list never even got written.

Today is a new day.  And I am choosing to walk forward with the perspective that I am exactly where I need to be, in every way.  I am trying to create more of that in my everyday life, and not just from those special moments.  I have the idea that the more we step outside of our comfort zone, and find the magical moments in life...the more we are able to see that they are always around us, just waiting to be found.

I woke up this morning and immediately did the dishes of previous days gone by.  I set up my study-station on the dining room table.  I took my seat here at the computer to write this post.  Who knows what the rest of the day will bring...hopefully some more pages being read form my book of the week.

I mentioned in my previous post that my book I am reading, Extremely Load & Incredibly Close (yes, I am starting to really remember the title), had a very powerful sentence.  Turns out it is filled with them.  Every page has a new thought provoking phrase, or after reading a chapter I might realize that the last few pages have been completely symbolic in nature, while still keeping with the story line.  I am finding the book to be very touching and inspiring.  Not inspiring in the sense that I am walking around beaming from ear to ear and spreading world peace, but in a creative and life affirming sense.

I leave you now to get on with my day, whatever it may bring.  But I have to admit, I do hope it brings me a deeper understanding of endocrinology, the nervous system and sight and hearing physiology for my upcoming exam.  It is interesting to bounce between literary fiction, exploring the emotional elements of being human; and anatomy & physiology, learning about the minute details of how our bodies keep us alive and healthy.

And one last thing, speaking of health: I have not forgotten about Healthival.  It continues on into February, with a few minor adjustments.  In addition to no wheat, no dairy and no sugar I have added no corn chips, I overeat them and feel like crap.  A little wine added in, for fun.  And I have made more phone calls to friends, well a lot of calls to one friend, but you gotta start somewhere!

So far we have 6 readers in on the "Book a Week" challenge and 2 reading two books this month! Anyone else reading along?  Leave us your vote of support on our poll.  Thanks!

xo
Melissa

A hole that every happy thing falls into.

Posted by Melissa Baumgart
"That secret was a hole in the middle of me that every happy thing fell into." -Oskar Schell, 9 years old.

That's a powerful sentence.  One sentence can make you feel so many things.

Oskar Schell is one of the main characters in the book I am reading this week, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Safran Foer.  It is currently in the movie theaters, and like the last book I read, is also up for an Oscar for Best Picture.  In the past, I used to love movies that were taken from great novels, so I could talk with people that actually read books and sound like I knew a little something.  Right now, after reading The Descendants and starting this book, I have different feelings about the book-to-movie phenomenon.

I think I only want to go and see The Descendants to keep the book alive, to relive it again without forcing everyone I know to read it out loud to me.  Like Jamie was doing today, he even called me on my way to school to share a funny part.  So sweet.  And already only 80 pages into the "Incredibly Close" book (that's what I call it since I can never seem to remember the order of the title words.  Sorry, Mr. Foer.) I agree with Amy, I just don't know if a movie could capture this book.

Amy shared with me that this is one of her all-time favorite books.  She said it is revolutionary in it's format.  But I think she used a smarter, more appropriate word, other than format.  Style?  Layout?  No, but something to that effect.

So far, I adore Oskar Schell.  His fears, his random thoughts, his creative inventions that cannot ever truly exist.  They all make for a lovable kid, at least from the perspective of a reader.  If he were my kid, I don't know if I would've had the patience for him day after day.  How sad is that?  That we often cannot see the magic of our own offspring because we don't have the perspective of the "reader", we instead have to make sure they are safe and fed and educated and all that parent-y kinda stuff.

Even in The Descendants, when the kids are saying outrageous things, I laugh.  If my kids said things like that, I would feel obligated to tell them how wrong it was, or to punish them.  Especially if some other, more parent-y kinda parent were standing there.  Why can't we just laugh sometimes in real life?  I don't know, maybe all this fiction is getting to me.  Maybe I prefer it.

Maybe we let all the happy things fall into all the holes we create form our perceived pain, and we forget how to laugh.  As a community, as a country, as a society.  Why do we all have to behave so goddamn perfect all the time?

Poor, sweet, Oskar Schell, though.  His Dad died.  To lose your Dad as a young boy...that must be a pain that creates a huge, cavernous hole.  I can't imagine him being able to laugh, for a while.  Even at outrageous teenaged inappropriateness.

-Melissa