Stories of lovers: Keeping Sane without Work

it's all books all the time here at le chateau bookling.

in this comfortable and slow solitude (i realize that sounds like a personal hell for some), i am rediscovering my voracious appetite for reading. in previous years, i could never start one book before i had finished another; but now, i find myself capable of such infidelity.

i am juggling 6 right now.
such scandal.

in each of these books, i am finding something to glean for each different little room of my soul. and these days, those needs are quite variegated.

So how does she juggle so many lovers, you ask?! Well, here's how it goes. I wake up and wander out to my spot on the couch. I pick up my Women Poets from Antiquity to Now and give myself a refresher lesson about whomever I am reading that day. Today, it was the gothic Mz. Emily Bronte. This is the book of sleepy, morning kisses for me; my coherence is subconscious at best and the sweet expository words linger even after I close the door.

I then wander over to Thomas Merton's Seven Storey Mountain which I find reminiscent of Augustine's confessions; a happy correlation for me. I have found MUCH pleasure in autobiographical writing these days; perhaps this is because I hope to do the same and am finding all of these meaningful examples. This is the book of passion for me; my eyes hungrily finger each word in a blind, fast fit of the senses. I cannot get enough fast enough.

I then feel the call of Mz. Plath. She is a nostalgic, illusive distant lover in a smart tweed suit. She smells like cigarettes and tragedy. She is the acadamian, the professor I am too intimidated to address. Lately, I have had to dodge into the shrubs when I see her walking into her lecture. I long for what I cannot have.

So I divert myself to Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet. This lover is the one that makes me giddy with pre-teen infatuation. Where has he been? Why hasn't he noticed me yet? So I will voyeuristicly read his letters intended for some other fledgling and unashamedly transfer his admonitions to myself. He speaks of solitude; he fails at marrying the need for human love with human solitude - but knows that all creative work is birthed from solitude. You had me at "solitude."

Thus ends my morning coupling.
I save the other two for nighttime...
When the imagination comes to life in my bedroom.

I tenderly open Watership Down. I look up at the clock, and I have been lost in the world of rabbits for the last 30 minutes. This lover is as a child loves her father-figure. She aches to be in his presence, but doesn't want him to know it. She admires him. She relys on him, takes his presence for granted. It doesn't feel too important, but only because she doesn't know a life without him.This will be a long read for me - I will nibble off a chapter or two and then mouth it, savoring its lingering aftertaste.

The last one falls into the category of my romance with educating myself. I am an information gatherer, analyzer, and implementer. We added a new addition to our lives last month, and I am determined to do as right by her as possible.

Ladies and gents, I give you the GEEEEEKIEST book ever: How to Think Like a Cat. This came as a recommendation from a friend, and it has been most helpful for this young cat owner (who has never owned a cat, much less any animal of her own).

~i told you. reading is sexy,
mme. bookling