Sometimes you read a book, and you can tell the giant library that is your mind has been added to.
Sometimes you read a book, and it's merely a reminiscence feel of knowledge you already have.
And sometimes, you read a book and the library is destroyed, the knowledge, the memories dumped onto the floor. And you are left, with only one book, and only one feeling, a mix of all the ones you are trying to feel.
And slowly, you begin to see that the library has not been destroyed. Merely re-organized. Into an entirely new architecture, that centers itself around this new book.
This new book that destroyed you, made you blind and deaf to the outside world. And then brought you back to reality.
Smart.
Wiser.
And understanding.
This isn't necessarily a quote from the book, "The Fault in Our Stars" by John Greene, but I wanted to try and describe to you how I feel.I mean, I connected with each and every character, with Hazel, merely because of everything she felt. With Augustus, because he drank the stars with his love, even with death in his heart. And with Isaac, who said goodbye to his friend without seeing him.
Now, I don't have cancer, and I've never faced a friend my age dying, I do know that someday I will. But today, I have not.
I know that someday I will die, and I realize-it's not about making the hugest impact on this world, for fear I would leave a scar.
I want to live to give my life, to share my love, and to enjoy deep conversations about what life really has in store. I want to appreciate the moments when someone holds a door open for me, or doesn't force me to make eye contact, or someone who understand a metaphor or joke that only I usually understand.
To some this sounds like love, to me it sounds like Life.
I'm not dying any time soon, God be willing, but each day is a gift that can't be returned at the Wal-Mart customer service desk, with a receipt that's been through the sewer system and back.
Life is a Christmas sweater from our grandma that whether you like it or not, is yours to keep-so you might as well make something out of it.
And sometimes, this happens. And when it does, you feel the pain.
The Fault in Our Stars by John Greene
A book just on time.
LizB
