Sexing the Cherry

Throughout this time of solitude, books have been an inspiration, comfort, and joy to me. At times the companionship of a book was so overwhelming that I chose my book over an evening out with friends. Over the past week some events unfolded that turned my outlook a little topsy-turvy. After dividing my time between finding a different course of action and moping around in my room, I picked up an unnoticed library book lying under the other books I had been going through distractedly. I had put away my la-la land books as I found myself drifting further and further away from things that were going on around me. But literature brought me back to remembering who I was when I was distraught by notions of who I wasn't.

"Every journey conceals another journey within its lines: the path not taken and the forgotten angle. These are the journeys I wish to record. Not the ones I made, but the ones I might have made, or perhaps did make in some other place or time."

"When I left England I thought I was running away. Running away from uncertainty and confusion but most of all running away from myself. I thought I might become someone else in time, grafted on to something better and stronger. And then I saw that the running away was a running towards. An effort to catch up with my fleet-footed self, living another life in a different way."

Winterson's philosophy on love in this particular novel was quite interesting, a departure from her more passionate proclamation in other works, and one that I can't say that I agree with, but I believe has some truth nonetheless:

"I may be cynical when I say that very rarely is the beloved more than a shaping spirit for the lover's dreams. And perhaps such a thing is enough. To be a muse may be enough. The pain is when the dreams change, as they do, as they must. Suddenly the enchanted city fades and you are left alone again in the windy desert. As for your beloved, she didn't understand you. The truth is, you never understood yourself."

- Jeanette Winterson, Sexing the Cherry, 1989.

Happy birthday to my mom, and to the King of Thailand! Wish the King good health, and I hope Thailand will see better days ahead :)