Books/Plays

Hey guys!

I'm looking for some new reads - I like biographies, like plays, but haven't found anything tickling my fancy lately.

Hilary's new book isn't well rated on amazon, so I have strayed away. Robin Robert's book was pure inspiration and had me bawling as I read along.

Now I was wondering if anyone had some good reads - as far as plays, I like Ibsen (A Doll's House), Tennessee Williams (Glass Menagerie, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Streetcar Named Desire), Death of a Salesman.

So... given my preferences... any ideas?

What are you reading?

Joey, over at Whose Life answered that question, and he had me intrigued with some gay oriented fiction books that he had read. What are some good reads right now? I tend to like realistic fiction and biographies, so read his post with great interest.

I finally finished reading Pride and Prejudice, my first big kids' book in a while, so I was proud, but was looking for something more to read.

Based on Joey's recommendation I downloaded The God Box by Alex Sanchez, as well as Desert Sons by Mark Kendrick, and the sequel to that Into This World We Are Thrown.

Are there any other good LGBT realistic fiction books to read, or any good biographies out there? My last biography I read was "Yo," or "Me," de Ricky Martín.

Getting myself situated

It is nice that this quarter does not seem too intense at school. It is giving me time to do things I really want.

So far in the past few days I've done the following:
- Worked- I've worked for the past 14 school days straight
- Washed my car
- Went to the gym twice
- Bought a going away gift and card for Dennis as he is leaving on Sunday to join the Peace Corp.
- Made an appointment to get my car serviced Friday
- Paid my speeding ticket
- Weedwhacked for my dad since he can't
- Bought shoes
- Caught up on emails
- Caught up on sleep
- Did my taxes and mailed the state
- I owe the state- BOO!
- Formatted my thesis paper and put what I have in it
- Researched a few things that I have been meaning to do - random stuff that came to mind

Now that all of these menial tasks are out of the way, one of those things I want to do is read more for personal enjoyment. I want to read "Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang" by Chelsea Handler and "Me" by Ricky Martin. I downloaded "Yo," the Spanish version of Ricky Martin's book tonight since I really need to continue to read and listen to TV in Spanish as I notice I'm forgetting some word meanings. Yo es my first ebook. I will see how I like it... I'm thinking an iPad 2 may be in my future if I do like it.

Want to reads

I keep running across this, yet I keep losing this list, and I really do want to read some of these books, so I'm publishing it here where I know that I'll have it.

The BBC apparently says most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here.

Instructions:
1) Bold what you have read
2) Add a '+' to the ones you LOVE.
3) Italicize those you plan on reading
4) Put in a note with your total in the subject

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield- Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hossein
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

My count: more than average... 28?

Some of these like Hitchiker's Guide I really have to question.

My favorite childhood book

I also loved Danny and the Dinosaur

Shame, splitting, and other thoughts from The Velvet Rage

This post probably won't be as great as my last post on fathers, but I wanted to get some more ideas out from that book The Velvet Rage.

People avoid shame through improving other areas of their lives. and focusing on academis or jobs. In the book, Josh sought out academic and business success to avoid shame that he felt for failed relationships, depression, and lonliness. This shame eventually just builds up and ends up being very debilitating.

I can see how in my life I have done this and it is so easy to do. This past year at school I started out in fall quarter lonely because most of my friends are at other colleges and stuff like that. I have tried so hard to meet people at my college, but have never made friends I could hang out with outside of the class because it is a commuter school, etc. etc.. That, compounded with other things had built up a lot of rage in me. I found pride in getting the good grades and doing my job at work and that was my sole focus. I remember feeling real lonely, kind of depressed like Josh in the book was, and was searching more online about this time for guys etc in my area. This is about the time I started finding blogs like I Think I May Be Gay and Daninokc where I found people who were in the same situation at me, which helped to see I wasn't alone. Sexuality was finally an issue I wanted to tackle in my life, so I see this is where I started channeling my interests into different things- not just school, work, but also guys, religion, and stuff like that. I see I wanted more to explore and target the sexuality issue in my life. I wanted to meet people and I see that I did try to. I did try craigslist and met a guy at my college, but that didn't work out. I started going back to church after a long while. I remember and I concentrated solely on school because I had nothing better to do, but thankfully I was able to see that emptiness and where it lies- not having more guys to hang around with etc. etc.. So I see that I've been able to at least start tackling that rage and channeling my energies into other things, so I'm proud of that, and honestly I feel like a better person in so many ways.

Other tidbits I'm going to reflect on from the book:

--- I'm defensive when sexuality is mentioned around me and I tend to defend my straightness around people. (p 45)

--- I am glad I'm not out having anonymous sex with guys (p 51), which the book says they do to avoid shame. I on the other hand could never do that, without not at least knowing the guy before hand, something about them, partly because I feel I need a great emotional connection with a person.

The big part of the book that hit home was the topic of splitting. Living 2 different lives and faking an entire segment of our lives "for the benefit of getting along in life" (p 47). That hurt.

I have FAKED my life with my parents for the past 4-5 months with The Guy and my whereabouts. I do feel guilty about it, which so many the author says so many don't. I do it because I see now is not the time to come out, but honestly I can't blame those who do live two lives because of family, religion, work, and so many other reasons. It makes me sad the labels and everything that sexuality places on people. I am now at a point where I am comfortable doing this splitting as much as I don't like to because I see this is the only way I can get out of the house. My parents are a lot more comfortable with me going out of the house now at such random hours, but it hurts to be lying, it hurts to be faking, it hurts to be splitting.

The author says that splitting often lingers "after you've left the first stage (of being overwhelmed by shame). If your coworkers don't know you're gay, you won't risk being treated like you're part of the 'out group.' If your parents are never allowed to visit your one bedroom apartment, they might not find out that your boyfriend is living with you. While splitting allows us to avoid shame, it also undermines our relationships. We are never what we appear to be, and over time, others begin to sense this. Trust arodes from our friendships with lovers, friends, and family" (p 48).

OUCH!!! Reading that paragraph made me so uneasy. So splitting is done tto avoid shame, which made me upset because I've done it, but it is all to easy to do. I have read tons of stories online about guys who are interested in guys and have that secret side of them their wives don't know about. I am ashamed that sexuality is so defining and that it is such a big issue in things like religion, family, and stuff like that. I hate that, there are so many great people who are gay/lesbian. Unfortunately I'm not willing to come out and so I'm leading a life in shame.

I also had to defend splitting. It seems alright and though I may be living in shame and everything, fine. I mean for me I grew up in a Christian household and everything, knowing how my mom would not be ok with the stuff I have done/me liking guys. Anyways, I was thinking more and more about how long I will continue to split my lives. I was thinking about how I have a hard time getting it in my head that I would date a guy. I am hapy having people to hang around with and stuff like that. While I haven't had much experience with girls... obviously I'vehad more experience with guys thusfar, I was thinking about the hard time I have with the thought of me dating a guy. It goes against a lot about what I was taught. I was thinking and wondering what is it that I want in a guy vs. what would I want in a girl... just sorting through thoughts. I was thinking in a guy I like the physical contact, I like having a guy I can talk about guy stuff with, I like the hanging out and doing guy things, kind of like what I have going on with The Guy. But would I be able to grasp the whole having a boyfriend thing? In a girl I like having someone I can talk to/get advice from, someone to go places with, but the list sort of seemed to stop there. Already, what I have done with The Guy has been better than with the 2 previous girls and I feel more of an interest from him, even though I remain friends with the 2 ex's, I think that we were so focused on maintaining our friendship and whatnot that we didn't let things just happen etc etc. I haven't crossed girls off my list, I find a lot of women hot, but I guess at this point in my life I really want to explore guys. I can't help but think how already I've felt completely different with The Guy than with any girl I've been in a relat. with.

I was thinking how hard it would be for me to ask a guy out on a date because so many guys are just into sex, it would be hard to find a guy that has the same interests as me. It seems like there are some things it is easier to tell a girl than a man. I was thinking how even though The Guy is great, he is a great guy, great friend, whatnot, I want to meet more people. Not friends with benefits or anything, but I'm saying friends, guy friends to hang out with. I would love to have some guys IN MY CITY, my age to hang out with on a somewhat regular basis. No, I'm not getting tired of The Guy or anything, but it would be cool to have more guys to hang out with, perhaps closeted guys, stuff like that to talk about things like religion, thoughts of coming out, random stuff like that, or even just straight guy friends to hang out with. There really doesn't seem to be any closeted guys in my area.

Anyways, I began thinking about living at home and how it kind of sucks. I just have to get through the next 12 months or so with the house addition/remodel deal and then I was thinking how I'll have my own apt. deal and can invite ppl over as I want and please, so it will make things easier to meet people probably, or at least have a girlfriend/boyfriend. Then that got me thinking also- if I were to come out and whatnot, would I really be happier and would I just be avoiding shame by having my own place and having people over. Lately I'm thinking more and more I'll just kind of let my parents discover I'm having guys over and they can make their own conclusions, which to me seems easier... whether it'll play out like that, who knows. But I was wondering if being closeted is the reason for lonliness or what. I am a lot happier and less lonely now that I have met The Guy, but I was thinking how maybe having my own apt. I'd be pursuing guys constantly and perhaps still be building shame inside because I've not chose to settle down or have a serious relationship. I don't know, that did cross my mind. I am sure that I'll be a lot happier because it will be easier to have people over like guys and my parents won't be able to say no, but I guess I just don't want to get caught up and keep meeting random guys and whatnot, but need to focus on meaningful relationships and stuff. I don't know... I guess for right now and for me to come out is not what I want, so i will continue splitting my life.

Velvet Rage on dads and war

On the way back from OKC I read the book Velvet Rage, which Creative Thinker recommended in his blog.

Creative Thinker does a great job breaking down each section of the book and setting it up, but I wanted to elaborate on the parts that struck me. I thought it was a good book, but not everything applied to me because I'm still not out. It did help me see that I am happy for the mostpart in my life because I have managed to avoid a lot of the destruction/esteem issues that the book talks about which gay men face, but see how if I were to pursue guys could avoid a lot of destruction gay men face.

It hurt me to see how my dad and I have had such a hard time relating to each other. We act so different, have such different ideas, have different personalities, senses of humor, and he's more reserved than me. He is very stoic, not one to open up about anything, whereas as you can see here in this blog, I'm very open about everything in my life and I love to chat about everything. I can see in the past year I am one who will stand up for my beliefs and take a stand, whereas my dad will do other things when he gets upset and tends to write a letter to the person, I am getting to the point where I have no problem saying why I'm upset and taking a stand. I'm much more talkative than my dad. I think I show a fun/loving side that I never saw from my dad, which I think is partly because I don't want to be like my dad who doesn't show emotion, who doesn't show all the concern I do.

Last year my dad went to his first army reunion with the men he was in Vietnam with. He reconnected with them after 37 years. My dad was not the emotional type and he never opened up about anything. My mom always said my dad had a hard time and that it was always a "Vietnam sickness." My mom blamed my dad about that for communication issues he has, how he doesn't necessarily tell everyone everything going on in his life, how he doesn't seem so connected to people, how he keeps his distance, how he won't face the problem head on, and for how he builds up his anger that bothers everyone in the family. I could use many painful examples from my life where this is true and how it could be that I'm not close to my dad because of this. I realize that I don't have any of those qualities... I'll tackle the problem head on, I like to be connected to people, and whatnot.

I began to realize in the past year that a lot about my dad also relates to emotions. In Vietnam my dad was forced to suppress a lot of emotions. By going to the reunion and through e-mail with my dad's Vietnam buddies he has became a different person. I did see my dad break down and cry at the reunion when the men were talking once. I heard the stories of war. My dad on the way back said that he has been healed and he has been able to deal with a lot of issues that have plagued him for so long. I saw a new side of my dad. When my dad returned home I saw an attitude change where he treated my mom a whole lot better and he opened up and was more sentimental. There wasn't abuse or anything going on in the family priort to my dad going to his reunion, but if my mom said something, after the reunion he was more sentimental, he seemed like he cared, he offered advice. Before it was just yeah, honey I hear you, a disconnect. My dad even opened up more about his life. I have learned a lot about his years growing up, some stories from Vietnam, just a whole new side of him - - a more emotional side.

I am not close to my dad, don't think I will ever be, but I have seen a changed man in the past year and I credit a lot of this to being able to confront problems he faced in Vietnam and come to grips with emotions thanks to meeting these men again. My dad has opened up more, my dad has been more like a father figure in that when I do have a problem I can tell him something and get feedback. I'm thankful for this, but to have that confirmed in the book was so nice. It said, "to start with our fathers were raised, as we were, to be tough, stable, and emotionally detached. On top of that, many of them were veterans of wars that forced them at a young age to suppress their emotions and to commit unspeakable acts against humanity in the name of patriotism. In sum, many of our fathers grew up in a culture that offered them power in exchange for stoicism and buried emotion" (p 14).

I was thinking on the plane had the internet been as popular and there 15 years ago, if everyone was online, my dad could have connected with his old buddies, began the healing process, opened up more, and maybe I would have a different relationship with him. Maybe he would have showed more of an interest in me (I'm not saying he didn't when I was young because I know he did and he did love me and showed his interest in me, just not in the ways I gues I wanted or been there in ways I had expected), but that maybe he would have been there in more ways and taken a more active role in parenting. My mom was the parent who was the main one involved in raising- she punished us kids when we were little, she checked our homework, all of that. My dad was the one who cooked dinner, would read bedtime stories to my sister and I, and would tickle us endlessly when my sister and I ganged up on him when we were kids. My dad is not a bad man, no, I'm not trying to defend him. He is a great teacher, smart guy, but he does have flaws. I do see how he is a great guy and how he was a good dad, but my focus of this post is how he was not the emotional type and the type of dad I was longing for to shower and hug me, and how I saw through reading this book he has changed in the past year, but also how Vietnam probably had an effect on him.

We got along for the mostpart, but we have not had a great relationship. We have had many fights over the years that have not been pretty. We yell at each other. I admit I used to go out of my way to tick him off and make him mad. I know what I did was wrong and I am willing to acknowledge it, but I can see how a lot of it was out of rage, rage for him not being the caring guy, not being there. I remember a lot of the fights we had was because how he wasn't interested in my mom, how I was worried about divorce, so I would in return treating him badly. I think my parents marriage in the past year has really improved and they have been married over 30 years. Now, my dad and I fight over things like his lack of organization, then the last big fight was about my sister's lack of responsibility, so I see how I have changed also and am picking battles I see as important.

I am not trying to get anyone to take pity on me here, far from that, I'm just sharing thoughts that came into my head while reading the book and telling about a few little events in my chioldhood. What has happened has happened, I can accept that, and have. I am content where I am today. I understand that there were many factors that went into the relationship we had and overall he was not a bad dad, just not the emotional type/showering type I guess I wanted. I know my dad is a good guy deep down. Anytime I need/still need money, he is there. That is one of the ways he shows love. Anytime I have a car problem, he is the one who will try to troubleshoot it. I am just seeing how things could have been different and the book opened my eyes to be able to reflect and see how he has changed in this past year after seeing his army buddies and swapping stories.

I can picture how things could have been different and how maybe he would have been more relatable if my dad had been able to deal with army experiences earlier. I could see that maybe my dad would have been there to teach me to play baseball and encourage me to join little league and all of that little boy stuff. My uncle from Rockford Illinois was the one who taught me to play baseball. I remember getting report cards and my dad would say "I'm proud of you" and leaving it at that. Just in the past year, even though now I'm college I see he acts totally different. He says stuff like "that's great, I know it is much tougher in college," then he'll usually ask about the tougher classes I take and where I went wrong. I see him more interested- whether this is a result of him opening up and being better able to show interest/happiness because he saw his Vietnam buddies I don't know, I can only guess this is a factor and it has only started in the past year, so I can think it may be that. He has shown a new concern I have never seen. I can see how in a year our relationship has got better, but also how it probably will never be great, and not the emotional relationship I crave.

It is sad that because of reasons like war, "most of us grew into our young adulthoods without having had a truly loving, honest, and safe relationship with a man" (p 14). We went to our mothers, I know I did because she "over-validated us to compensate for the betrayal she saw us suffer" (p 15). Maybe I would have felt more comfortable going to my dad to talk, rather than going to my mom. I am closer to my mom. When I got a report card she was excited, call the whole family, brag to friends, and the like. I like that validation, and validation is something everyone needs, so I see why/how my relationship with my mom has prospered. My dad and I don't see eye to eye on a lot of things still, but I do see how and why this could have happened, and how things could have been different. I know my dad loved me, but I didn't get the love I feel and saw from my mother. My dad provided a different love. A mom's love I guess is more showering and praising, help, nurture her kids. Whereas with a dad you see he loves you by doing things for you, slipping you money when you need it, helping fix your car, but that is not what I wanted, needed from my dad, and I would argue so many of us needed another kind, more emotional, the same love from our fathers as our mothers gave us because what "you craved from him was love, affection, and tenderness. As we have seen, what most of us received from our fathers was far less" (p124).

I just can't help but wonder how my dad and my relationship could have been different if he could have tackled these emotions earlier from Vietnam, would he provided that loving, emotional attention I so desperately wanted from him? Would him and I have had all those fights we did years back? What would have been different? Would I be a different person today because of that?

Reading for the plane...

Since I'm leaving for MS next week, I'm planning to raid Borders tommorow night for reading material. I already bought The Velvet Rage as recommended by Creative Thinker. I am not a reader to begin with- after reading all the time in school, reading is the last thing I want to do. I know however, that since I'm going to be on a plane and with people I don't know, plus a lot of time to do nothing on the plane I might as well read. Plus I have a couple long layovers. So I want 2-3 books I can read and a couple alternates if one is not engaging enough for me or I finish one and I run out of things to do. I typically like biographies, so The Confession sounds good about the former governor of NJ. But I am not wanting to pick up a ton of books on the subject of sexuality and then risk having someone like my friend or anyone in my family see them. I plan to keep the books in my carryon bag and not advertise them, but you know, paranoia. Also don't want a bunch of books sitting around I haven't read or won't read. So I just did a quick search on Amazon and came up with a couple books I might check out. Has anyone read one on sexuality that was really enticing? I don't know why I'm interested in reading about this suddenly, but why not? Here are a couple things I'm thinking about... Coming Out of Shame and Coming Out Everyday. Any thoughts? Any good reads about sexuality/coming out worth checking out?