The best sampler cd from a music magazine I've heard in ages, The Dreamers has, aside from everything else great about it, two gorgeous covers of classic songs...

 

"You Don't Own Me" (originally recorded by Lesley Gore) more than holds up in Policia's hands while Julia Holter's take on "Don't Make Me Over" (Hal David/Burt Bacharach) is as absolutely mesmerizing as her wonderful treatment of "Hello Stranger" on her album Loud City Song. The woman truly makes interpreting well-known songs a magical thing...

 

Still, it’s the album’s centerpiece, a hypnotizing six-and-a-half minute rendition of Barbara Lewis' “Hello Stranger”, that might just be the most uncomplicatedly gorgeous thing Holter’s ever done. It’s risky to tackle a tune that’s been covered enough times to make it feel like a modern-day standard, but Holter’s atmospheric take finds a particular strain of longing and serenity in the song. It's a heart-stopper. Amidst the rest of Loud City Song’s chatty, high-concept vitality, “Hello Stranger” is a moment of comfort and instant connection, like suddenly spotting a familiar face on a busy street.-Pitchfork magazine

 

CMJ calls her "woozy" and I think they mean it in the best way possible...what a dreamy voice she has.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I really, really like The Girl You Left Behind, more for the writing and insights than the actual plot or characters. And how JoJo Moyes respectfully handles the subject of grief (she so gets that there shouldn't be a time stamp on when we stop hurting) is just beautiful at times.

 

There are many times when Liv (one of two main characters the novel focuses on) is engulfed in her grief. When she goes to a gay bar (not wanting to be alone, but not wanting to be hit on either) she drinks (or tries to) herself into oblivion:

 

 Now she is trying to climb back onto her bar stool. She makes two attempts, the second sending her stumbling backward clumsily. She pushes her hair out of her eyes and peers at the bar as if it’s the summit of Everest. She propels herself…

 

Not too long after, she tries to explain to Paul, a man she has just met, that she and her husband really did have something special:

 

We didn’t really fight. Not about toothpaste or farting or anything. We just liked each other. We really liked each other. We were . . . happy.” She is biting back tears and turns her head toward the window, forcing them away. She will not cry tonight. She will not.

 

Her daily "coping strategy" is way too familiar to anyway who has ever tried to forget:

 

She had begun running after she had realized that she could use the world outside, the noise in her earphones, her own motion, as a kind of deflector. Now it has become habit, an insurance policy. I do not have to think. I do not have to think. I do not have to think.

 

One of my favorite passages, though, comes from the first half of the book, where another woman (living in 1916) is also missing her husband (a prisoner of war) terribly. She remembers their first impressions of each other, thinking he reminded her of "a cross between a Roman emperor and a Russian bear." He, in turn, told her:

 

"The first time I saw you I watched you standing in the middle of that bustling store and I thought you were the most self-contained woman I had ever seen. You looked as if the world could explode into fragments around you and there you would be, your chin lifted, gazing out at it imperiously from under that magnificent hair…"

 

There is so much genuine love in both women's stories, whose lives intertwine through a portrait, the same title as that of the book.

 

This is the first Jojo Moyes book I've ever read. I think what surprises me most about The Girl You Left Behind is how natural the read feels, even when there are elements that could seem contrived or gimmicky (like Mo, the snarky sidekick hiding a big heart behind her Goth appearance or the emotional plot twists that make you cry despite your determination not to.)

Never once did I feel manipulated by the author or roll my eyes at the sweetness of both love stories...with a less skilled writer, this could have easily happened. As far as I can tell, there are no plans to film this in the immediate future. Maybe that's for the best...this is the kind of novel you want to play out on your own mind's screen.

 

 

 (There is also an underlying sense of humor within that keeps everything from getting too morose.)

I finished She Sings of Old, Unhappy, Far-off Things a few days ago, but needed some time to think about it. The writing is most definitely lovely and the story compelling. There is a lot going on in the novel and the author's style makes you want to savor every single word. The characters talk to themselves way more than I'm used to in fiction, but don't many of us do that in real life?

She Sings can dig down deep and pull at the reader's heartstrings. Though nothing like this has ever happened in my life, I relate all too well to Wyck when she says: "I don't want this, damn it."

You can find yourself feeling things you never wanted in your heart, things that are better left outside of it. Wyck has a philosophy that speaks to anyone who finds humanity a bit too much sometimes: “Plants and animals – give them enough time and attention and love, and they’ll never let you down." But, telling yourself you won't fall for somebody doesn't actually keep that from happening, would it be that it could.

The distinct differences between Wyck and the woman she grows to adore, Margaret, drive this novel, making it both oddly endearing and exasperating. Margaret, supposedly older and wiser, had me putting down my Kindle a few times to blow off some steam. I get how hard it is for her to give up the life she has known for decades for a love that her own relatives find hard to accept. I do get that. Homophobia hurts most when it comes from family.

But I also understand Wyck's disillusionment with Margaret's reluctance to come out: “When was the last time your life was threatened because you were a lesbian, Margaret? Oh, that’s right. It would never happen to you because you’ll never acknowledge the truth of who you are, right? You’ll lie and deny and get married so no one will know."

It's these heartache and struggles swirling through the story that make it both believable and less sappy when Margaret finally (and genuinely) finds others' attitudes about love bewildering: “What scandal? I’m a fifty-three-year-old widow who fell in love with someone else after my husband died. Where is the scandal in that?”

I will definitely keep this on my Kindle to be reread someday soon. :)

 

Yesterday was my mom's birthday. My parents and I had a nice time and we got along better than we have in ages. I was so happy my mom liked her presents and we joked like we used to in the old days.
For the first time in months I actually felt anxiety-free.

When we parted, my mom said, hugging me fiercely (which isn't something she usually does), "Are you sure you don't mind that you're not married?" I didn't get mad because she asked it in a light tone. I answered that I was fine with it, that I had gotten used to being a spinster and kind of liked it.

My mom looked horrified and told me not to talk about myself that way. But I think sometimes if we use a word that isn't necessarily flattering, we can take away its power over us. And I don't mind. I am (using a very antiquated word) a "spinster." Dictionary.com refers to it as "disparaging" and "offensive," but Urban Dictionary has this comment:

Note* A woman who never enters marriage contract is so smart.

Of course, Urban Dictionary can sometimes be brutal so some of the other definitions for spinster aren't so nice. Some of them, like the one below, make me laugh:

 A woman who kept on believing in fairytale-like love stories for too long.

 

This article on the same topic is rather intriguing:

 

http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199270606.001.0001/acprof-9780199270606-chapter-6

 



For the first time in weeks I had a really nice dream. It was more memory than made-up so that might have had something to do with why I didn't feel disappointed when I woke to reality, but I think it was more that having the dream reminded me that once upon a time things were pretty good in my life and they can be good again. I think I just have to reset my self and my attitude.

Plus, I see pins like these on Pinterest and I find comfort in them: