Hungry for Paper, July 16

I was craving a book. I needed to read. My conversations with Guro rekindled that desire to devour written words, pages at a time, until my eyes hurt and my mind forces me to quietly ponder new perspectives and ideas. Buying a book though, can often be an overwhelming and trying experience for me. Presented with choices numbering in the thousands, I often leave a book store empty handed, unable to decide on one book that I feel I have connected with. Today though, I was on a mission.

In any major city, there will always be more than one book store that will have an English section. In Oslo there were several and I easily found one with a large section devoted to my native tongue. I quietly perused the selections, letting my eyes rest on the spines of the books, contemplating author and title. Atwood, Ondaanje, Hosseini, Herbert. Celebrated and acclaimed authors, some I have read, others I will read later, and of course there were those I wished to reread. For a long while, I stood, randomly selecting sections to read titles, until a name became clear to me. Coehlo.

Coehlo, the author of The Alchemist, perhaps the most personally inspiring book I have chance to read. The Alchemist was given to me by my friend, Nadya, just as I was leaving Ottawa for my adventure. Although a small book and simply written, it reverberated through me as I placed myself in the story. I would happily read more of what this man had thought to pen, perchance there would be more inspiration to be drawn from his books.

From the book store's selection, I chose two books that intrigued me the most. A novel about madness, accepting it, and living in a world that strives for normality (Veronica Decides to Die), and a collection of Coehlo's thoughts, essays, and short stories (Like the Flowing River). Indeed both these titles gave me much to reflect upon. The former led me to be more accepting of the little bits of crazy we all have, hidden or not, and the later influenced my decision to be more faithful in keeping my journal up to date and to allow myself more freedom to express my thoughts. Some of those thoughts will remain in those journals and it will be many years before I allow them to be seen by curious eyes. Others, I suppose I will freely express as I feel necessary.

All in due time though.