Searching for a Raison'detre

Read EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE by Jonathan Safran Foer. Broke my heart a year ago. Still breaks my heart now. It's about a kid whose father died during the Sept. 11 attack in NY and now he's trying to understand the msytery of the key he found in his dad's closet.

His search takes him everywhere. But all in all, what he was looking for was a new raison d'etre. Touche. All he ever wished was that time can run backwards and then they will both be safe back in their beds, his dad telling him the story about NY's sixth borough the night before he died.

With Daddy it would have been like this:

The taxi would've ran backwards coming from the hospital. We'll carry him back inside the house. He would've stood up and cooked Christmas ham. Then the visitors would have left walking backwards. Then I would've smelled the Spam. Then ......

Then moving the right way forward again, I'll use this time to stand up when I smelled breakfast cooking. This time, I'll wake up, choose to help cook breakfast. I would've fed Daddy something. Anything. His glucose wouldn't have had crashed. He would've eaten something. The visitors would have arrived, told him they can fix the washing machine. They could've fixed the danged machine. They could've left and we could've been watching tv.

3 days later, we could've been celebrating Christmas as a whole family. Then Mummy might not have died of loneliness. I'm sure it will not remove her cancer cells. But...

it would've been a complete Christmas. Even if it was really the last.

I can't imagine Christmas. I can't.

I love Christmas. I could not bring myself to hate it even now. But what is Christmas without family?

I need a new raison d'etre. I want... a way to excise the pain. But maybe what I need is a way to go beyond it. And still live a life.

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