The Mountains of Tibet

I just re-read The Hundred Dresses, a book that was given to me at my 9th birthday party. It’s cute. On the back, it says “$4.95 US, [Higher in Canada]”. Which made me laugh.

Reading children’s books always reminds me of the one book that I feel like I can honestly say changed the way I perceived the world, as a child. It’s called, The Mountains of Tibet, and it was written and illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein.

[I just took a break to see if I could email this author and ask for permission to read his book on YT and possibly make a flash video, but all I’m seeing are his agents. I will look into this further. I’ve been wanting to do this since before I knew what YouTube was.]

The Mountains of Tibet is a story about a woodcutter who has always dreamed of visiting faraway places, but never left his valley. He dies, and he is given the opportunity to either go to heaven, or choose to live another life, any life, anywhere in the universe.

He chooses to live another life, and through the course of the book, he must choose which galaxy, which star, which planet, what species, what race, where to be born, which parents to have, and so on. In the end, he chooses the life he’d just come from, except that he wants to be born a girl this time. To see what it was like.

Needless to say, this book was a far cry from what I’d been taught in Bible school, or what I’d heard in church every Sunday. Reincarnation? I didn’t know what the word meant at the time, but I did understand that it presented conflict with the Catholic Church. I also understood that I liked this concept better. Reaching back as far as I can into those early childhood memories... I don’t remember ever believing in God or hell. I remember believing in heaven.

Also, most three-year-olds don’t really think about life beyond what’s going on in their own house. I don’t know if I did then, but I had the book memorized when I turned four and I distinctly remember laying awake thinking about my house, my street, my town, my state, my country, continent, planet, solar system, galaxy, universe... and then I would do it all in reverse, trying to picture which star I would choose, and if I’d end up on Earth, and whether I would still choose Michigan. I used to play a game with my dad, it was “roll the ball” except the ball was a globe, and he would choose a country, roll it to me and then I’d have to find it, choose another one, roll it back, and so on. We probably didn’t play that until I was six or seven, but when I think of the globe, I think of The Mountains of Tibet.

So from an early age I understood that not everyone believed what the Bible taught, that the world was big and there were many different kinds of people in it, and that it was okay to want to be a different gender. I know gender isn’t the focus of the book, but it did shape the way I thought about boys and girls.

Plus, it’s just a fun story, with great pictures. It is by far my favorite children’s book, even over “The Hungry Hungry Lion”, which I made my mom read to me at least three times a day in the years preceding kindergarten.

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In other news...

I still feel stuck. Never in my life have I been goal-less. I don’t know what to do with myself, and the more I brainstorm new goals, the more stuck I feel. Tis frustrating to the extreme.

Do not mistake my frustration with depression, however. In my day to day life I’m actually pretty happy. I’m going to see Alan tomorrow, Colleen over the weekend, and Hank on Monday. I’m pretty excited about all three, although I will say I hope Chellie doesn’t bail on me for the Hank thing, because that might be awkward...

Yeah. Youtube-wise, life is great. Great community, great commenters for the most part, great friends. I feel, for the most part... accepted. I have not yet gotten to the point where I’ll private my videos until revenue sharing is enabled to maximize the revenue views, which I think is good. I am definitely past the point where I watch all of my subscriptions though...

Hm.

I miss having friends to hang out with IRL. I only know one person in this town, and she’s working full time, dancing part time, has a boyfriend and still reserves time for family. So we don’t see each other often.

Maybe I’ll meet some cool cats in my classes next week.



For now, I need to go to bed.

Love,
Monica

Book Update

It's been a month since I posted about the Book Challenge, so here's what I've been up to for the last few weeks. Bear in mind it's been Christmastime, so I haven't gotten a ton of reading done.

4. The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold (audiobook)
I listened to this when I drove to Michigan & back for Thanksgiving. It was a good audiobook for driving; Alice Sebold narrated the audiobook and I liked her voice. She read very well, in a way that only an author can read her own work properly. The story itself was good, too. I became interested in the character, a 14-year-old girl who had been raped/murdered and was watching her family and friends from heaven. It was an interesting premise, and although I don't buy into the whole "heaven" thing, it was presented in a way that made me accept it. It's more girly/romantic than my usual fare, but in a way those qualities made it refreshing.

5. The Almost Moon, by Alice Sebold (audiobook)
Same author, different reader for the audiobook. I started listening to this on my way back to Boston after Thanksgiving, but didn't finish it... and honestly didn't care to, until my drive back to Michigan a few weeks later. It's not that it wasn't well written or well read, because it was... it was just of a subject matter that I was not interested in, whatever. It's about a woman who kills her sick old mother in a moment of frustration. The story takes place over the next 24 hours or so, maybe longer. I think that's actually what I didn't like about it. It spent so many pages talking about such a short amount of time. It really dove into the way the woman was feeling and reacting to what she'd done, and it did so beautifully, but not in a way that really pulled me in. I don't like the tv show "24"... I guess I would rather have story than excessive detail. That having been said, this book was strongly recommended to me by a friend, and I've heard great things about it... it is good... just not really for me.

6. Oryx & Crake, by Margaret Atwood
This may very well end up being my favorite book of the year. I LOVE dystopian societies, or stories about the future. 1984, Brave New World, The Giver... all on my top ten favorite books. I don't know what it is about them that pulls me in, but I LOVE IT! Anyway, Oryx and Crake deals with what happens when humans start to play God, purposefully mutating animals to do certain jobs or fulfill certain tasks, to the point where Crake ends up creating an entire new species of humanity... I won't give the whole story away, but it was right up my alley. I loved every second of it. This one I will read over and over again. Five stars. Fo sho!

7. The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak
So very beautifully written. Amazing. My first time through I read primarily for the story, but I have a feeling I'll read it again next year simply for the poetry. What a change from most YA fiction books! I hope English teachers everywhere are making their students read this. It's a little long, but there is So Much in it! I can definitely see why it won the Printz. Roughly, it's about a little girl in Nazi Germany who loves to read. I won't say anything else... I wouldn't want to ruin a single element of the book. Zusak's characters felt so real. It was incredible, and I hope I never forget the way he talked about the sky.

Currently reading:
The Year of Living Biblically, by AJ Jacobs (pg 29)
Obama's Challenge, by Robert Kuttner (pg 20)


By my calculations, I'm two books behind. O_o Uh oh! I better start reading!


In other news, life has been pretty good... not very eventful. I've been chatting more with Hank lately and a lot more with Alan and Liz. It's nice to make some new friends.

I still need to sign up for classes for this term. I can't apply for jobs until I know my schedule, and I also need to finally (dum dum DUM!!....) tell Greg I left Brandeis. I'm positively -dreading- this conversation. But I need him as a reference, so it's gonna have to happen.
Eek.

We'll see what happens. That's kinda been my mantra these days. I don't know what's going on in any aspect of my life, which is more than a little disconcerting. I'm writing a song for the ukulele though, which is going surprisingly well. I've got everything written, I just need to up my skillz so I can play it for YouTube. So far I haven't been able to get through it. It'll be at least a week before I can, probably.... but that's not bad seeing as I only started playing a week ago. :-)

xoxo
Monica