first things first, let's start off this post with a catch up from last week's
photo theme thursday. part of the reason i put it off is also because i didn't have a good picture but i got one that i like tonight!
curved
i think this is the turtle firework that ended up getting flipped on its back.
i hope everyone had a safe and happy fourth of july. i had fun with my parents and sistah. there are more pictures and videos on my facebook page and also on my new google+ page (though i'm still trying to figure that out. side note: if you want an invite, send me your gmail address).
there is a tertiary reason for this post. i finished reading a pretty interesting book last week and thought i'd give it a little review.
by Michelle Huneven
"Patsy MacLemoore, a twenty-eight-year-old history professor with a brand-new Ph.D. and a wild streak, wakes up in jail—yet again—after another epic alcoholic blackout. This time, though, a mother and daughter are dead, run over in Patsy's driveway. Patsy will the next decades of her life atoning for this unpardonable act. She goes to prison, sobers up, marries a much older man she meets in AA, and makes ongoing amends to her victims' family. Then, another piece of news turns up, casting her crime, and her life, in a different and unexpected light. Brilliant, morally complex, and often funny, Blame is a breathtaking story of contrition and what it takes to rebuild a life from the bottom up."
i wasn't really sure to think about this book when i first marked it "to-read." occasionally i do like to read something a little heavier, a little tragic (last year it was The Rest of Her Life by Laura Moriarty) but alcoholism is a tough subject for me to read about or discuss without getting emotionally involved. i saw it at borders during their "going out of business" sale and got it for a bargain.
the first couple of chapters confused the heck out of me. first, i didn't realize that the point of view had changed from the girl, Joey, to the woman who Joey had met briefly, Patsy. second, it takes a little while to get used to Huneven's writing style. she doesn't use quotes or really any conventional markers when her characters speak. at the same time, though, once i got into the groove of things, i found i liked this style better. it allowed the words to flow more smoothly; it made the dialogue feel more natural.
after the first few chapters, i kept waiting for a BIG DRAMATIC MOMENT. guess what? it doesn't ever really come. you can tell what the "big surprise" basically is from the first of the book and it presents itself slowly. it doesn't slam into your face.
it wasn't until after i had finished the second to the last chapter that i understood what Blame was really about. it's not about an alcoholic, a drunk driver, a murdered family torn apart, it's none of those things that it appears to be on the outside. instead, it's really just a book about handling whatever life throws at us and about taking responsibility for our own actions. i think that's why i really liked this book in the end. it's not that it has some big happy ending - it's that patsy always takes responsibility for what she has done and learns from her past mistakes. she doesn't spend her time feeling sorry for herself or blaming others, although it is hard for her not to do so at times. it's also about learning to forgive ourselves and accept our own imperfections. every past experience has brought us to where we are today and we have the ability to change where we are in the future by the choices we make now. pardon the cliche, but it's not the destination that matters, it's the journey that gets you there. this life is all about learning and living to our fullest extent and i think patsy shows us how to do just that marvelously.
