Book Bingo: June 2020 - Final

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

First and last, a big thank you to kingstoken who provided the card and thus made a fervent wish (to do a book bingo) come true for this reader.



Banned Book: Les Fleurs du Mal by Charles Baudelaire [translator: Richard Howard]. I loved this book, and I bought it, and it's a keeper. But to be fair, this was my process for each poem: read in French, listen to French (on librivox.org), read English. It was the first book in a long, long time that I have actually had to look up words (the English words!) and that makes me very happy. That's a poet translating a poet and making another poet very happy. And Baudelaire was a miserable bastard (and so am I, these days) so I feel a kindred spirit when I read these poems. Also, lesbians and vampires.

Classic: The Brothers Karamazov by Fydor Dostoevsky. 700 pages of ugh. I even read the Cliff Notes along with it so I understood better what I was reading but still, ugh. There was one line that reminded me of Crowley (of Good Omens) and my Season of Kink bingo card.

But he is not Satan: that's a lie. He is an impostor. He is simply a devil — a paltry, trivial devil. He goes to the baths.

I had planned to read Orlando by Virginia Woolf but the opening scene of that book is Orlando playing sword-fighting with shrunken African heads hanging in his family's attic. I couldn't go on after that. The boys' father is African and the decapitated heads of Africans are not toys for children to play with. It makes me rather ill. So I literally googled 'classic literature' and scrolled across the listing to find one that I hadn't read and that I would consider reading. I didn't realize how long The Brothers Karamazov was when I picked it out but I am stubborn and when I did figure it out, I was too stubborn to quit. Also, I am very tired of the 'village idiot girl' gets pregnant trope.



I have been struggling lately with my choice of literature. Apart from this bingo, I read and listen to mysteries. And mysteries, as a genre, almost always include a police element, if not the police as the main protagonist and hero. I know that these detectives are fictional, and that real police do not operate like that. In real life, they don't help, they don't solve problems, and are, in every case, part of the problem. They are there to protect property, not people. Violent, racist, and when not actively being violent, looking the other way so that their violent colleagues can operate with impunity (both on the job and off of it, in situations of domestic violence). So, for example, I turn on an audiobook of Maigret [which is kind of like a French episode of Law & Order] to distract me from the torture of cooking dinner and there is no joy, no distraction, just another layer of torture that it is something that used to provide escape, but doesn't. I understand the answer is to switch genres but that is easier said that done. I am in-between places. Not able to find pleasure in what I used to enjoy and not yet having discovered a replacement.

And I did not enjoy two of the books that people I admire enjoyed and so I would really, really like to cut, I'm dying to cut, actually but I may have an opportunity to go to a BLM vigil tomorrow afternoon and I don't want to hold up my sign with arm slash marks (it's 90 degrees here, so long sleeves would be uncomfortable) so I am postponing it. I feel also that I don't even harm myself for a noble anxiety, like police brutality or systemic racism, just these petty personal failings that matter to no one but my hateful brain. Not liking a book, who cares? My brain does. A lot.



So here's the full list:


The First Book in a Series: A Death in Vienna by Frank Tallis [ebook]
Diverse Reads: The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey
More than 300 pages: The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides [audiobook]
Humour: Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh
Non-fiction: The Interior Castle by Saint Teresa of Avila
Book Mentioned in Another Book: Death Comes to the Archbishop by Willa Cather
Book on Display at the Library: Transcription by Kate Atkinson [audiobook]
Movie/TV tie-in: War Horse by Michael Morpurgo [audiobook]
Banned Book: Les Fleurs du Mal by Charles Baudelaire [translator: Richard Howard]
An Animal on the Cover: Devotions by Mary Oliver
Set in Your Country: We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson [audiobook]
Classic: The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky [e-book]
FREE SPACE: The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin [audiobook]
Mystery/Crime: This Poison Will Remain by Fred Vargas
Food/Cooking: Tea Cyclopedia by Keith Souter [e-book].
Title has a Name in It: Lord Darcy Investigates by Randall Garrett (e-book)
Children/YA: Clay the Cromer Crab and the Invasion of the Jeellyfish by Salena Dawson
Colour in the Title: Colour Scheme by Ngaio Marsh [ebook]
Award-winning Book: Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie
Dystopian: A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
Published in 2020: Slippery Creatures by K. J. Charles [e-book]
Romance: Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
An Author You've Never Read Before: The Raven Tower by Anne Leckie [audiobook]
100 pages or less: Binti by Nnedi Okorafor
POC Author: The Frangipani Tree Mystery by Ovidia Yu

Comments

[ellieet]

I can relate to a lot of what you're saying right now. My OCD has been very severe in the past several weeks and it's hindered my enjoyment of a lot of stuff - I haven't read any proper fanfiction for a while, haven't written anything and can't find any escape. I thought I'd try to read actual books but even when I pick up a book I've got stuff going around my head and a lot of what's happening in the book itself doesn't help, especially if it's dramatic or scary - I can 'feel' the characters' anxieties coming off the pages in waves and they don't feel like an escape either.

During my first few weeks at home, my family would have a film night after dinner and it was the most relaxing part of my day, but even then, there were nights when the choice of film made me more anxious; The World's End, for example, which I really could have done without. Watching television is the only thing I can manage and even then, enjoying the normal stuff like Sherlock or Good Omens makes me sad because I feel as though I can't write fanfiction right now; that's normally my go-to response. I'm even struggling with Endeavour, although I have managed to write a little fanfiction for it. The anxiety just seems to creep in. So I hear you, absolutely. The only thing that's been making me happy is the new BBC drama Staged, because it confronts the world we're currently in, and makes it funny.

Regarding the cutting - I am so, so sorry to hear it and I do have some idea of how hard that can be. With my OCD, I have to resist compulsions; my OCD comes under the religious flag and I've been badly triggered by a lot of evangelical, fundamentalist shit on the internet recently after falling down the Google rabbit-hole and I kept revisiting websites I knew I shouldn't, to try and make sense of what they were saying/double-check what they were saying, which of course made me all the more upset and start seeking reassurance, which is my main compulsion - I either run off to cry to somebody and seek out human contact, or (and this is very embarrassing, a habit left over from my OCD as a teenager, before I was diagnosed) I seek help from a vicar. I've sent a lot of different vicars messages, either in email form or on twitter; affirming, progressive vicars, including the Reverend Richard Coles, who you may or may not have heard of (just in case you haven't, he's a celebrity vicar here in the UK who is famous for being a former pop-star turned priest, and who is openly gay and very supportive of the LGBT community). He replied and everything and he's just one of several religious people I've reached out to in an OCD crisis. I am mortified, but that's what the fear drove me to.

Yesterday, I was finally put on anti-anxiety medication and it's making me see things a bit clearer. I know I can't rely on it to fight my compulsions, but it helps me recognise what the compulsions ARE. Another one I have is repeatedly praying which I just cannot get to grips with. So, while I realise it's nowhere near as painful and distressing, I know what it's like to need to delay something, or distract yourself, and to have trouble doing that. I try and use mindfulness in my case, or being with other people, or putting my phone away, or even grounding; I had to deal with the urge to go Googling this morning and found that grounding - being aware of where I was placing my feet, focusing on what I could hear, and feel, etc - was a great help to me and took the edge off. It hurts my head, not my body, but I do understand at least a little.

And I'm so proud of you. <3

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

I am sorry that you've been suffering lately. It is a very anxious time, but that doesn't make it any easier on an individual level. And, yes, it is frustrating when you can't find a release (or when you find a less than optimal way of releasing). But at least you're getting help (re: your meds) and that's wonderful. You are taking positive steps to get on with your life despite the anxiety and compulsions. So I think you should feel good about that. Yes, things are awful but you are fighting back. And so I am proud of you, too :)

I'm sort of stuck in a lot of ways. I have black sons who will grow up to encounter systemic racism and violence (police and otherwise). Their father is black and so he knows what it feels like to walk around in black skin (and the discrimination and racism that comes with that) but neither of us grew up as black Americans so it is different in that way. And I cut ties with my extended family (except for my sister) because they voted for Trump in 2016 (both my parents died a long time ago). So I don't have a lot of people in my life. I don't work so I don't feel like I have any financial control over my life. So, for example, if my sons' father doesn't want to go to this BLM vigil tomorrow (and he looks like he doesn't) then I won't go even though I am desperate to do something. And I don't feel like I can ask him for money to donate to good causes, like bail funds or other organizations. And I'm a closeted queer because the boys' father doesn't believe homosexuality exists so that shuts down a lot of conversations and opportunities to feel connect to real people, not just my online friends who are really wonderful and supportive.

All this to say, there are a lot of dynamics and reasons to feel trapped and anxious. But you're doing very good to get hekp and use your tools. Really, sometimes in the grand scheme of things, I think cutting is the least of my problems, but it is sort of a signal of how everything else is going. Keep doing good things and I have faith that one day your enjoyment of things will return. Best to you.

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

Oh and please never apologise for your compulsions. I am the last person who would judge you for emailing or tweeting vicars. I have been called That Crazy Bitch on three continents and in many, many languages. I've done decades worth of embarrassing things for stupid brain reasons.