Search This Site




Philadelphia Weekly - The Trouble With Spikol


 

 

 

 

Cost of the War in Iraq
(JavaScript Error)

 

 

« MOST IMPORTANT NEWS OF THE DAY | Main | First Person, Singular: "This Last Month" »

Friday Is Funday?

0192838628.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

Try as I might, I can't find any upbeat stories about mental illness. Today it's all gloom and doom. It's raining here and is one of those days that makes me want to stay home with my head in a book. Right now I'm reading The Forsyte Saga (a trilogy with an interlude) by John Galsworthy, and it's just about the best thing I've ever done with my time. The interlude -- "Indian Summer of a Forsyte" -- made me cry so hard, I simply could not recover myself for hours. I still feel sad about it.

After my talk at DBSA, the group gave me a gift card to Barnes and Noble. How could they have known how perfect that was? It calls to mind my favorite quotation:

"People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading."

That really sums up my entire existence.

[Part of this image's name is "LZZZZZ." Were I in the frame of magical thinking, I'd see that as a sign.]

Comments

It actually has two interludes, Liz! I went to a library today and found that book just to see what could cause so much crying (I didn't have anything else to do today). Actually, I took a bus up to a nearby mountain town and found the book in the mountain town's library. (It got to 109 degrees here today, so I ran from the heat).

Anyway, I found that book and I started reading the second interlude (I think it was called something like "Awakening".) It didn't seem too cry-worthy, and I looked at the table of contents and saw that there were actually two - two - two interludes in that one book. To be honest, I didn't even know that books could have interludes in them at all.

Well, now I know that, and I know what was so sad also. The guy died just when he was so elated and relieved and full of anticipation that his niece was really coming to see him, and just before he actually saw her. It kind of reminds me of a line from a song I heard long ago: "We are but a moment's sunlight, shining in the grass."

Addendium to previous comment: "fading in the grass" - not "shining". (I got one word wrong):

http://xenia.media.mit.edu/~kristin/songbook/CampfireSingalongs/GetTogether.html

Post a comment

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)

About

self portrait web final.JPG

Liz Spikol is senior contributing editor of Philadelphia Weekly. She writes the award-winning column The Trouble With Spikol, which began as a chronicle of her struggle with mental illness, and has since expanded into humorous musings on everything from graphic novels to how to use a mop. She also writes the paper's book review column, Lit Gloss. This blog -- named one of the Top 10 Bipolar Blogs of 2007 by PsychCentral -- is about mental illness policy, news, personal journeys and more.