I'm begging you, please wake me up/ In all my dreams I....

Ah, Edith Wharton. Decided to knock off the last two of hers that I have left on the list: Bunner Sisters and Summer. Both are super short, so you could probably read them in about an hour and then come back and finish this.

In some ways, both are a bit unusual for Wharton, though in different ways. If you, like just about everyone in the entire universe, think Age of Innocence or even House of Mirth, you'll feel a bit disoriented. If you think of Ethan Frome, you'll be closer.

That said, both novellas (let's get real here) are interested in the same main topic as Age of Innocence: the ways women's lives and identities were controlled and constrained, and how the narrowness of roles for women was a destructive force.

In Bunner Sisters this is explored in relation to the roles available to unmarried women over 30. In Summer, we get a sort of Tess of the d'Urbervilles experience. It's as fun as it sounds. Essentially, women are punished for desire of any sort.

Rather than going on a Franzen rant, I'll just end this by saying that, though Wharton's exploration is interested in gender and its relationship to the regulation of desire, you could reflect on her themes through many lenses.

Bunnies? I don't know what you're talking about, but I like the sound of it!

So, I've noticed that if you read and send text messages at the gym, no one pays any attention at all. But, if you read a novel by Edith Wharton, all of a sudden everyone is interested.

Hey, I just met you/ And this is crazy

There are many things that I love about my neighborhood. While its main selling point is its proximity to my job, there is lots more to love.

For example, people have a tendency to leave books outside for free. Now, generally these books tend to be of three varieties: romance novels, how-to books, children's books, and policy books. Today I got lucky, however! Someone was getting rid of several books that are on the list.

It does lead one to wonder why this person's whole collection seemed to be on the list. Are they working on this project, too? Likely he/she/they are moving, so I'll never meet them, but there you go.

The ones that you should fear the most may be the ones you fear the least

Yes! We have finally made our goal for list books in 2012, which is to say that we've finally read 100 books on the list this year. "Why did it take so long?", you may well ask. It's a very reasonable question, for which I don't have a good answer. I sort of have three thoughts, though.

1. I've read some long books. Some very, very long books. One took me a month, it was so long. This isn't a super great excuse, though, since I also read some really, really short ones.

2. I've done a lot of reading not on the list. I was doing quite well on the project this year up until August when I went on a serious non-fiction kick that has sort of continued; plus, there is always the temptation of the New Yorker.

3. Another reason that I've slowed down a bit is that I no longer am spending so much time each week metroing to and from Clarendon. Which, on the one hand, great life choice on my part, but on the other hand, not so great for the project.

At any rate, yay! As a reward, I'm going to read Joseph Anton, because yes, I do know how to celebrate. I also might use this as a chance to read the next longest book on the list.

The things that we could do in 20 minutes, girl

Have you ever said to yourself "Man, I'd just love to read a book about a slightly disturbed woman (spoiler alert: sort of) who drives around rural Scotland picking up male hitchhikers for dubious reasons"? Yeah, me neither. And that is really all I have to say about Under the Skin (which apparently is going to become a movie).

And addicted to the knife, she needs a little help with the agony

And now, if you will indulge me, a brief and unrelated interlude:

Have you ever noticed that we sort of consistently have to eat? That it is not something that you ever get to cross off your to-do list? You can never achieve haven eaten, you'll still have to do it all over again. It starts to feel a bit pointless, no? Which then leads to perpetual trips to the grocery store, which is very sad.

She won't let you feel a thing unless she wants you to. She twists the blade. He feels it.

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the stories that we tell ourselves. These musings have come from both some of the more painful (in a good way!) books I've read recently, as well as things in my own life. I'm fascinated by the ways we make meaning from our experiences, the ways that we interpret our realities and through those narratives shape these realities in these dialectical ways.

Part of what fascinates me in all of this is how we construct these narratives without even realizing that we are doing so. It's almost instinctual. I'm reminded, in a strange way, of this course on epistemology that I took once. We had all these conversations about the question of whether objective reality exists, whether there is a capital T Truth, and about how interpretation shapes reality.

I am also fascinated by the cognitive dissonance that somehow manages to coexist in these narratives. I can know that I have constructed this part of my life in a way that tells a story that I can manage, that I can be all right with, even as I know that it is not True in that capital T way, even as I know I am constructing it for my own ability to cope.

It's an interesting lens to apply to novels, since I see this cropping up over and over again. Particularly with  most of the ones that I've read recently (Everything You Need, Surfacing, Rabbit Run, After the Quake, etc.). This is another one of those times that I almost want to write an academic paper.

Oh, you're gonna be my bruise

I've had so, so, so many awkward encounters lately! And they've all involved men and the gym in some capacity. One doesn't quite qualify perfectly, since it happened as I was walking to the gym, but we'll count it.

However, none of the three involve the list project in any way. They just involve me being awkward, so they don't really fit here.

I liked my memories as they were/ But now I'll leave remembering her

In addition to chapter books, picture books were a significant part of my childhood. We have a fairly epic collection of picture books, and many holidays have specific books that I associate with them.

One residual piece is that I whenever I have to mail a letter, I have a tendency to imagine myself as a character from A Letter to Amy. This is a bit absurd, I must admit, since I only ever mail a rent check to my landlord.

It's later than you think/ And a kiss is a terrible thing to waste

So, I recently read Notes from the Underground. It's a quick read, so I read it while at a Barnes and Noble. Did not take that long. Not my favorite by him. That said, the passage about tyranny and love was exquisite. Sadly, I couldn't note it, since I was reading in B&N, and I couldn't find it online, so here are a few others to enjoy:

Every man has some reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends. He has others which he would not reveal even to his friends, but only to himself, and that in secret. But finally there are still others which a man is even afraid to tell himself, and every decent man has a considerable number of such things stored away. That is, one can even say that the more decent he is, the greater the number of such things in his mind.

To love is to suffer and there can be no love otherwise.

Yet, I didn't understand that she was intentionally disguising her feelings with sarcasm; that was usually the last resort of people who are timid and chaste of heart, whose souls have been coarsely and impudently invaded; and who, until the last moment, refuse to yield out of pride and are afraid to express their own feelings to you.

I love, I can only love the one I've left behind, stained with my blood when, ungrateful wretch that I am, I extinguished myself and shot myself through the heart. But never, never have I ceased to love that one, and even on the night I parted from him I loved him perhaps more poignantly than ever. We can truly love only with suffering and through suffering! We know not how to love otherwise. We know no other love. I want suffering in order to love. I want and thirst this very minute to kiss , with tears streaming down my cheeks, this one and only I have left behind. I don't want and won't accept any other.

If there's a slower death than living here and now/ They haven't found it yet

If you have a hobby, there comes a time when you have to decide if you recommend it for other people. This may happen because people start asking you if you'd suggest they take up said hobby, or it may happen because you spend too much time imagining hypothetical conversations you may have to experience at some point. Regardless, when it happens, you must be ready.

Some of my hobbies I would recommend without question or hesitation to anyone who asked me. Barre method, for example. Why? Because it is the workout that still typically makes me want to cry and/or die on a regular basis while doing it. Which is how you know that you've found a good workout.

With others, it seriously depends on the person. Trapeze is a good example. Should you take up flying trapeze? It really depends on the kind of person you are. Do you enjoy hanging upside-down in mid air? How do you feel about heights?

With the list project, I wouldn't really recommend it to anyone. There are so many reasons to not do this, and not too many to do it. If it doesn't automatically appeal to you without needing to ask, you won't enjoy it. Plus, I'm not sure there is much to be gained from it; at the rate I read, there are some books that I sort of completely forget, so it's not like you're gaining all this knowledge or insight or conversational material, even.

Someone would leave. Someone always leaves.

It's been awhile, but we always come back to it. Today's awkward encounter occurred while I was waiting for an abs class (why I have been taking an abs class is an awkward story in and of itself) with the abs instructor.

AI: Wow. You always have a book.
In my head: This is the third time that you've seen me.
Me: Oh, yeah.
AI: What are you reading?
Me: Ada, by Nabokov.
AI: Ah. What's it about?
In my head: Incest! Incest! A couch.
Me: Um. It's sort of a love story between these two people who met when they were younger and then reconnect later
AI: Ah. Love story. Nothing wrong with that.
Me: Right.
In my head: What?
AI: So, how do you like the class? Right amount of challenging?
Me: Oh, yeah.
AI: Are you an instructor?
Me: No.
AI: Oh.