Our Town

Somehow I have never read or seen the play Our Town by Thornton Wilder. I have seen clips when performed in various movies or TV shows, but I knew very little of the story line. Over the weekend I decided a classic was just what I needed. It’s an extremely quick read, around 100 pages, and since it’s a play it reads very quickly. If you’ve never read it or seen the play, it’s definitely worth reading.

The book makes you ask yourself questions. Do humans ever realize how wonderful life is while we live it? Even the mundane everyday tasks are beautiful. Life is a gift and so many of us don’t realize how truly wonderful it is till it’s over. The ending had me in tears and really made me reflect on how much of my life I take for granted.

I also want to mention one of my favorite parts of the book. In Act II when they are discussing a soon to be wedding.  The stage manager says:

    ” George and Emily are going to show you now the conversation they had when they first knew that… that… as the saying goes… they were meant for one another.

      But before they do it I want you to try and remember what it was like to have been very young. And particularly the days when you were first in love; when  you were like a person sleep walking, and you didn’t quite see the street you were in, and didn’t quite hear everything that was said to you.”

As soon as I read that I was reminded of the way I was when my husband Jeff and I first told one another how we felt about each other. It really described me so perfectly, I clearly remember his family teasing me because I seemed dazed all the time, and I never really seemed to hear them when they were talking to me.  I really love how he captured “young love”.

This book is a classic for a reason and I highly recommend it… 5 stars.

MiddleSex

I finished Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides, about a week ago. I mentioned before that I was reading it and how much I was enjoying it. It’s taken me about a week and still all I can seem to say is ……Wow! Really, this is a book you just need to read. There is so much to the book, so many facets, so many themes, that I am having a difficult time putting my thoughts on the book into words. 

   

The story is about Calliope who is an hermaphrodite, but grows up not knowing. She “is a girl” for 14 years until she finds exactly what it is that she/he is. She narrates the story in memoir form, yet gives insight to what other characters were thinking and feeling even before she was born. It tells her story, but also the story of her parents, and their parents. It takes place a cross the globe, but mainly in Detroit and Turkey. Everything is beautifully woven together, and it’s one of the books that just becomes part of you. 

  

I have always been interested in the stories of those born ambiguously gendered. So this book was fascinating to me, but there is so much more to the story than that alone. I really can’t say enough good about this book, and highly recommend it. I give it 5 stars.