Four Things To Read

[Lest this become a blog sub-entitled "I Went To Graduate School, and All I Got Was Smashed," I decided to show you these four things. Two are fiction, two are non-fiction--and I can't stop reading any of them. Serious, I've read all of these countless times, over and over again. And sometimes I stop and think about them, and then I have to run to the internet to read them again. They all, in their own unique ways, have some modicum of perfection to them. They have all grabbed me, tightly, in their words. The way that only the best writing can.]

Fiction

1. Mix Tape for a Dead Girl by Joshua Allen

I think part of my obsession with this is that the death of my close friend Ryan was still raw when I first read this, linked from A Cup of Tea and a Wheat Penny. It reminded me of the things we do for the dead, the memories we hoard for them. There are still days when I want to write him an email or a text message, days when I want to send a quote to him or tell him about my data.

There's also a quiet brilliance to this, a point where he goes back to a previous point and the story starts to develop. I only wish I could be so subtle a writer.

2. Anniversary by Abigail Schilling

I first connected with this piece because it quotes one of my favorite songs, but fell in love with it because it made so much sense in the context of my relationship with Joey.

"I loved you that way. You were only a twinkling."

Non-Fiction

1. Lost in Translation by Kevin Keck

This is a fucking brilliant essay about the love in a family. It touches on the Communication Gap between generations and what it means to care for a deteriorating family member. I posted it earlier this year in my Tumblog, but it deserves a second mention here:

"Thinking of all this, I am filled with remorse — a beautiful word that comes from old French which literally means to be bitten again. And I am bitten continually. When I see my parents with my children, I feel trapped as a thought between two languages, with no adequate word in either tongue to express what I am feeling. So many things about my father that I found confusing while growing up have finally been deciphered with the Rosetta Stones that are my children."

I love that phrasing, that idea--"I am bitten continually." Because I am. I think we all are.

2. [untitled] by Eden Marriot Kennedy at Fussy

An essay about the death of a friend and the things we keep behind. Hers were a pair of shoes, mine are a set of pipets.