I have just begun to read a New York Times book club
recommendation, The Folded Clock: A Diary
by Heidi Julavits. Her prose is beautiful. Remembering the diaries she kept as
a child, and re-reading them with interest in order to discover some early
evidence of the person (and writer) she’d since become, she is somewhat
horrified to find that the diaries revealed her ‘to possess the mind of a
paranoid tax auditor.’
Like many of the diaries I am sure most of us kept as a
child the entries all began with ‘Today’ and then went on to list all the
things that her day had held: ‘Today I went to school’. ‘Today, I went to
Andrea’s house.’ ‘Today, I did nothing.’ Julavits writes amusingly of how she,
‘exhibited no imagination, no trace of style, no wit, no personality. Each
entry is an accounting of (or an expressed anxiety about ) my school
performance.’
In the The Folded
Clock, Julavits writes in diary form a (according to the blurb on the back
of the book!) ‘…meditation of time and self, youth and aging, betrayal and
loyalty, friendship and romance, faith and fate, marriage and family, desire
and death, gossip and secrets, art and ambition.’ I am only on page 16 and so
do not feel equipped to write with authority as to the books content, but I am
liking, already the fact that she starts every diary entry with the word that
dominated her childhood journals, ‘Today.’ Unashamedly, I decided to copy her.
The only similarity between my ‘today’ and hers though, is simply the word.
Today, the summer ended and three children returned to
school. Enthusiasm was not high but at least for this one day they all looked
smart. Today, I forgot to take photos of them looking smart.
Today I made healthy smoothies for breakfast. Today, I felt
like a good mother even though only one child drank them. The others ate pop
tarts. Today, I am not going to worry about pop tarts.
Today, for the first time in 13 weeks a whole day stretched
in front of me which I could use simply for work. Today I went for a manicure
this morning and met a friend for lunch.
Today I made a coffee shop my office. Today I climbed a
mountain of emails, texts, Facebook messages, direct tweets. Today I felt like
a Munro bagger.
Today I enjoyed the sunshine and took a long, slow walk
through the streets I call ‘home’. Today I decided that when one lives in
Scotland you should always take ‘sun days’ not ‘snow days.’
Today, I picked myself up and dusted myself down. Today, I
recognised that I might have to leave some of the dusting down until tomorrow.
Today I picked myself up.
Today I wrote some words when I had no words. Today I wrote
because I have something to say.
Today I noticed that when you fall you still move forward.
Today I fell forward.
What did you do today?
Today I read a blog. A thoughtful and well crafted blog. Today I went to bed encouraged and inspired. Thank you Jenny. X
ReplyDeleteThank you so much! Really kind & encouraging of you to say. X
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