November, Recapped

I’ve always been someone who disappears into books. No matter what I’m going through, there is comfort to find within the pages of whatever I’m reading.

For a few months this year, I really struggled to even enjoy the act of reading. It was the first time in my life where I just…did not want to read. Or couldn’t!

And then election day came and went. I can’t describe the pain I felt, and still feel, when I think about that loss. The communal loss.

I pulled back, holding my sorrow in clenched fists. And, too, I spent entire days, lost completely in my books, the way I haven’t been able to, for such a long time.

I was recently speaking with one of my best friends about upcoming policies, which will change so much, and not for the better. I went to her with fear, and left the conversation with something different to hold. Hope? Not necessarily.

I told her I don’t know how to recommend books to people, if the tariff tax is put into place. Books, already expensive, will become even more so. My favorite thing in the world, turned into a “luxury item”. How will people turn to books, if they have to choose between that and…groceries?

(Yes, libraries exist!! Used bookstores!! I love both of these resources.)

She told me that stories will be more important than ever in the upcoming years. People need comfort and sources of joy–of which books are often both. And books from people of color, as well as the queer community, are more important than ever to read and pass along.

Maybe what I left the conversation with is something adjacent to hope. Or, perhaps it is hope, but I’m so tired of being hopeful and having to face the all-consuming despair when the hope is squashed, that I’m in denial of it. Diminishing it.

I’m realistic about what’s to come. I don’t feign ignorance. But if I’m hopeful about anything, it’s the communities I cherish. I believe in the strength we hold, in facing what’s to come head on, together.

Reading:

It’s not very often that I return to a book I decided wasn’t for me. With Private Rites, the newest from Julia Armfield, the first time I picked it up, I quit at the halfway point. This devastated me, as the title was a highly anticipated new release from a beloved author.

This was back in June, and all of these months later I simply couldn’t stop thinking about it. Something in my gut told me I had misunderstood it entirely, and to try again. So I did! And it is now a new all-time favorite.

It’s a loose retelling of King Lear, set in a realistically dystopian future, where a near-constant rain has changed the way people are able to live their lives. Most of the ground is uninhabitable, or completely flooded, causing people to move higher and higher up. Or, well, those who can afford it.

An architect who set out to try and design houses for such people dies, leaving behind three daughters, none of whom have a good relationship with him at the time. They barely understand one another, either. But they must try to come together, to understand the legacy their father has left behind.

This, like Armfield's previous works, has a strong focus on water. The prose itself is drenched, moving languidly along as we are deeply embedded in each sister’s life. The ending, when it arrived, was sudden and brutal and shocking…and completely foretold from the beginning. This is one of my favorite things I’ve ever read. It’s a true gem, which is what I spend my year hunting for.

I equally adored City of Night Birds, which is a book about ballet, but also aging and realizing someone you love might not be right for you. Natalia, once the world’s most revered ballerina, has been out of commission for a few years, due to a career ending injury. The injury came at a time when compromises were going to have to start being made, and now she fears her final years as a dancer have been taken from her. That is, until she gets an opportunity she can’t refuse, at the studio she started in, back in Russia. She returns, only to find herself confronted with all—and who— she tried to leave behind.

I could have read it forever, and am still thinking about it a few weeks later.

Listening:

Every time Chicago has its first snowfall of the season, I am reminded of my very first snow in the city, ever. I was on the train home, when the cabs pulled out of the tunnel, and I saw that it was snowing. I looked out the window, mesmerized. When it was my stop, I got out and looked up at the sky. I was in another world—I swear I felt every single flake of snow. At the time, I had a song from an album I love playing, one which I now tuck away and listen to almost exclusively during the winter.

The song, I Feel How the Snow Falls, is from an album called Passive With Desire by Choir Boy. It sounds exactly like the first snow in Chicago.

Watching:

Aside from my fiancé and I making the brave (and unfortunate) choice to watch Dexter together, I tried to find things that were really fun to watch this month. Laughter felt imperative.

If you’re looking for a show which you’ll burn through and then be left wanting more, I cannot recommend English Teacher enough. It’s about an english teacher at a school in Austin Texas, who continually finds himself up against the board, students and parents. It’s self aware, and chronically online in a way which avoids being annoying, or dated within the next five minutes. When was the last time we got a really good comedy? I love it.

Very late to the game, I finally watched Twisters, which my fiancé very accurately described (upon walking in on me watching it) as “Jurassic Park, but with tornados”. Yes, and also… cowboys.

I loved it. It was really silly and sexy, and a total breeze to sit through. I wanted five more just like it, as soon as the credits rolled.

Eating:

Rice bowls with kimchi, sharp and sour, right on the front of the tongue. Homemade ramen, with coconut milk in the broth and curry powder to taste. A third cup of coffee. Pretzels coated with cheddar cheese dust. Brussel sprouts sauteed with balsamic. Staff meal during a Saturday double–tacos, with meat bought from the hispanic grocery store down the street. Stale bodega crackers. A breakfast bar. Tart blueberries.

Recommending:

I am hoping my library hold for The Message becomes available this month. It’s a nonfiction book from a journalist named Ta-Nehisi Coates, who had originally set out to write about his writing process. A book about writing!

Instead, what he found himself grappling with was how our stories, both reported and imagined, expose our realities.

It’s three intertwining essays, set in Senegal, South Carolina, and Palestine. Each essay examines the lives lived in those areas, as well as the devastating gap between the narratives we’ve accepted and the reality of life.

My aforementioned friend, Kim, told me it’s a perfect book, and she hasn’t been wrong yet.

Until next month: happy reading.