It's just a little crush

I used to worry that maybe I liked books more than they liked me. That they were just flirting while I was falling hard, allowing me no more than a glimpse of the odd beauty coiled in an unexpected phrase, enough to keep me panting behind, while secretly going all the way with the hipster girl up the block, the one with the polka head band and the yellow lunch box.

It felt like I needed to read them more than they needed to be read by me. There are plenty of readers out there and some books, some of the classics, have been read so many times I wonder if they're just tired of it. But I would have been stranded without their company -- on the BART, on the muni, out for coffee, over breakfast on Saturday, in the afternoon on Sunday, after dinner, before bed. Stranded in my own head with only the things I've seen and done and heard to keep my mind off my mind.

I held them close.

I introduced them to my friends, set them up with articles and essays I thought they might click with.

I alphabetized them, made lists of their titles, quoted their epigraphs.

For a while, I even thought I was ready to make a real commitment. I wondered aloud in their presence about becoming an English professor, a journalist, a book reviewer, even an editor. I looked to them for encouragement. I fanned their pages. Nothing.

I guess I worry that I'll lose them, that one day I'll turn to the faded blue bookshelf in the bedroom and find nothing of comfort, of beauty, of weight. Like that episode of the Twilight Zone where the poor book-loving bank clerk finds himself half-blind and alone, forever. Even though he's surrounded by books, he has no way of reaching them. They're lost to him.

It might seem odd to talk about books so stubbornly as if they were people. But then I consider the attachment I feel, the fear of loss. The way I talk about characters and wonder about them and worry about them; they are the people I spend the most time with. And, just like a person, as soon as I stepped back and gave them room to breathe, they were there. They returned to me in waves: Paul Madonna, Alison Bechdel, Roddy Doyle. E.M. Forster and Ford Madox Ford. c.d. wright. Luke asked me to read Anne Carson out loud. Zadie Smith had a piece in the NYR.

I still don't know if we'll ever go steady, books and I, if we'll make a real go of it. But I know they love me, even if they can't say it. And that's enough for now.

There are many times when I wish I could do Job's voice

on Arrested Development when he says "Come on!" I've tried but I just sound squeaky and silly in a stupid way, not a funny way.

Like for example, there were several individuals using snorkling masks and breathing tubes at the public pool the other day. I mean really, folks, it's not the Great Barrier Reef. In fact, I think the decreased visibility provided by my fogged up goggles usually makes the experience a little better.

But I can't do the voice so this kind of comment is not really so impactful.

The newest installment of The Book Club, in which The Bunny trashes Twilight...

I did not do a great job of packing books to bring with me on a two-week trip to Israel. Distributed between my backpack and my duffle bag so as to cause minimum damage to the back muscles I have already destroyed by carrying bags of groceries up 16th street were:

• one book of short stories by Dave Eggers (contemporary, cold)
  

• two books by Ian McEwan (who, boy, if you thought he was just a nice Englishman who likes hiking, you were wrong, he's way creepy)
  


• one book by Michael Chabon (which actually would have been fun but I never got to it)
  


• one book by Primo Levi, in French, about the Holocaust (I mean, really)
  


• one book by Jonathan Franzen (that also would have been fun but was so long I couldn't get up the nerve to start it)
  

This doesn't even include the page-turners (=sarcasm) by Jim Crace and John McPhee that I was gonna bring but then decided not to at the last minute and left in NYC. Looking at this list, one notices a distinctive lack of what might be called "vacation reading." So I was pretty vulnerable to the lures of easy entertainment when I arrived at the bookstore next to our gate in JFK, with a twelve-hour plane ride and countless bus trip ahead and glossy paperbacks all around.

I had already heard about Twilight from friends, including my virtual friend Slate. I knew it was about vampires and teenage love and was written by a Mormon woman and had some sort of abstinence agenda to push but was also rife with sexual tension. So in the interest of cultural studies and also supporting the rights of the undead, especially their right to be fiendishly attractive, I bought it. It only took a few minutes to rationalize. Overall, I was quite pleased with myself.

Until I read it.

I was prepared for the unpleasant "men feel urges that they can't control without the help of women" message and the tired "he seems like a bad boy but that's just because you don't know him like I do" fanstasy and the altogether disturbing "I love him because he might hurt me" subtext. I was prepared to be fascinated, offended, appalled. But I wasn't prepared for a main character with no personality traits other than being utterly self-sacrificing, unrealistically clumsy, and hopelessly in love (which doesn't really count as a personality trait). And I certainly wasn't prepared to be bored.

My anger reached its pinnacle while reading the "preface" to the second book in the series, which the publisher thoughtfully appended to the end of the first text. This installment begins with Bella's 18th birthday, meaning that she is now technically a year older than Edward who is only 17 in human years, although ~100 in vampire years. This difference in age fills Bella with a sense of her own mortality and the bitter knowledge that she will age and grow while Edward will remain in the body of a gorgeous 17-year-old forever. She feels sad and anxious and resists celebrating her birthday with all her effort.

The utter absurdity and injustice of the fact that an 18-year-old girl would already be concerned about how the aging process will make her unappealing to her partner -- who is, of course, immune to aging and will be desirable for all of eternity -- is really too much to bear. It's almost too upsetting to bother complaining about. It makes me wish that Lyra Belacqua could move not only between worlds but between young adult science fiction series and show Bella what it means to be the heroine of an epic...

Taste Test

A few months ago I participated in a beer-tasting at a friend's house. In spite of my general proximity to beer -- what with the carboys in the closet that hang out and ferment and sometimes spit up on my jacket -- you'd think I'd know a lot more about how it's supposed to taste and the proper terminology used to describe said taste. But the technical language -- the top notes and bottom notes, the acidity and astringency, and even the comparisons to other familiar substances like grass, flowers, and grains -- doesn't help fill in any of the blanks for me.

So I have developed my own language for talking about beer, one that I think is more evocative and also more fun, if somewhat less scientific. Below are my tasting notes from that night.

1. Dry, bitter. Pale ale? Like being stuck in a conversation with someone you don't want to talk to at a party.

2. Bright, edgy, toothy. Like biting your tongue in the same spot twice.

3. Vaguely sour, fruity, round. Like hanging out in your best friend's basement on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

4. Light, sweet, bubbly. Like wearing a sundress.

5. Light, plain, simple. Like someone you don't want your friends to meet.

6. Yuck. Bready, bunrt. Like wearing a coat that's too warm.

7. Bitter, full, real, honest. Like making a great point.

8. Gingerbread! Like a fake smile.

9. Strong, dark, syrupy. Like getting caught in a storm.

10. Soda-pop. Like wearing a skirt that flies from your hips out when you spin.

11. Strong, spicy, saucy. Like slapping someone across the face, playfully.

My notes indicate that #7 was my favorite...now, if only I could figure out which beer that corresponds to...