Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

Warning:  Spoiler alert near the end of this post:

A week or so ago I found myself in an airport without having packed reading material, so I picked up this compelling novel on the fly (literally!).  I give it five stars for beautiful writing, an unforgettable main character and a plot that was not frenetically paced, yet I couldn't put it down.

Eleanor Oliphant is one of the quirkiest characters I've ever encountered.  Often the stories we find most compelling are those in which we identify with a character, and aren't we all a bit quirky?  Turns out Eleanor is more than quirky.  She isn't just sarcastically funny; a traumatic childhood has made her a  judgmental misanthrope.  She has convinced herself that she is just FINE with her lonely, insulated life, boring job, and vodka best friend.

As the story progresses, she reluctantly is drawn into several warm relationships despite her resistance.  These relationships change her.   At the same time, events force her to look inward to the reasons she is the way she is.  It is painful for her; painful to read, but a welcome turning point in her life.  It's been a long time since a book brought me to tears; this one did.

But here is the SPOILER, so read no further if you want to avoid it.  At the very end, there is a twist that (in my opinion) doesn't fit with the rest of the story.  It makes Eleanor seem even more disturbed than previously indicated.  It deprives the reader of a satisfactory confrontation that one has been anticipating and looking forward to.  It is a conflict-resolution moment that never comes. It left me hanging, angry, and anxious -- my own quirky self wanted something very different and now I'm left with.....

July 2018

I was going through old computer files this morning and stumbled on something I wrote a few years ago that seems even more appropriate to think on as I get older.  And older......




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REGRET – IT’S JUST A WORD

            Recently while reading a magazine in a doctor's office waiting room, I saw that the magazine was sponsoring an Essay Contest.   My writer's radar perked up.  A writing challenge?  For money?  For a bit of fame?  All one had to do was answer the following question in 1500 words or less:  If you could change one decision you made in your life, which would it be?

            Oh dear.  Regrets.  Regrets.  Thus began my memory bank scan; trolling for something to write about.  Something entertaining but not too embarrassing.  Having the advantage of many years, there was no shortage of questionable decisions, varying from critical to banal to just plain stupid. Could I actually write about any of them? I began to imagine them on a colorful Wheel of Fortune, spinning and finally stopping on the following.

            When I was sixteen years old I lived in Rhode Island and had a regular babysitting job with a French family in my neighborhood who were visiting the States for one year.  The family name escapes me now, but somehow I still remember their cute little French-speaking children, a boy and a girl, named Gilles and Fleur.  I was an A student in my first year of high school French and loved being able to practice with them.  My language was rudimentary, but I could communicate well enough with them.  "A couche!" I said when it was time for bed, and off they went!  I was speaking real French with French people!  How pleased I was with myself.  When it came time for the family to return to France, they made an incredible offer.  Would I be interested in coming along, to live with them and study in Paris for one year and continue babysitting the children? 

            Excitement and fear gripped me.  I'd never traveled much, other than a few family camping vacations to New Hampshire and one big RV trip to Quebec.  But I'd never been on an airplane -- France was an ocean away!  Did I speak the language well enough?  What if I got homesick?   I would miss my friends.  What high school drama back home would I miss out on?  Would I be bored?  Did they have television in France?  Did they know about the Beatles?  What if I hated it there?  My father teased me and said, "You shouldn't pass this up because you fear toilet paper in France won't be as soft as you're used to.  Opportunities like this only come around once."  After agonizing over the decision, my fear won out and I chose to stick to the safety of the familiar.  Home.  To this day I wonder why my parents gave me a choice and didn't simply go ahead and sign me up.

            Years later, when I was fortunate to experience quite a few trips to a number of European countries including France, I realized what a momentous fork in the road that offer was.  How different my life might have been!

            What if I had gone to Paris when I was sixteen?  How would things have been different for me?  Perhaps my college ap would have been more impressive and I wouldn't have been rejected from Harvard.  Perhaps I would have majored in a more interesting and employable French instead of psychology.  My generation wanted to save the world; perhaps I would have joined the Peace Corps and changed the lives of starving children in Africa.  I picture myself teaching peace and love to the Hutus and Tutsis and preventing genocide in Rwanda.  Or, Perhaps I would have stayed in France and attended the Sorbonne in Paris.  Later I might have met a Frenchman to be my husband (he would have been very romantic and rich!).  I could have become a pencil-thin, fashion-conscious, unsmiling cheese-binging cigarette smoker with a yappy purse-dog always with me.  Perhaps one August night I might have been enjoying some jazz piano at the smoky bar in the Ritz Hotel, chatted up Princess Diana while Dodi was in the mens room.  She might have been so captivated by my ex-pat stories that she might have chosen not to leave to get in a car with a drunken chauffeur that fateful night. 

            If I'd gone to France for a year at age 16 I could have changed history!!

            On the other hand, I could have gotten sliced into pieces in Rwanda, or joined my new friend Diana in that car.   Perhaps my romantic French husband would have kept six mistresses and my cheese and cigarette diet might have led to an early heart attack.

            I could have gone to Paris and returned to little Rhode Island changed to a worldly, snobby girl; looking down at my friends and family as provincial, not fitting in, sniffing at the idea of a peanut butter sandwich.  How can you put her back on the farm after she's seen Pahree?  Or I could have arrived in Paris and quickly decided I was lonely and miserable, unable to tolerate the rough toilet paper.  I might have immediately begged my parents to bring me home, adding yet another excruciating failure experience in my young life that had already suffered from a C or two on my report card, wallflower status at dances, a serious bicycle accident, lusting after a boy who fell for my best friend, and being kicked off the cheerleading squad.  Oh, and then my rejection from Harvard.  Ah well. Teen angst might have reigned supreme whether I went to Paris or not.

            Perhaps. Perhaps. Perhaps.

            Some people say life can be a bowl of cherries.  I think of it this way: Life is like a cherry tree; each decision along the branches reaching up and out toward the blossom and fruit.  The branches on the tree of my life could have had an infinite number of different outcomes.   Had I studied in Paris when I had the chance, some other blossom would have bloomed for me, perhaps a bigger, more colorful one, perhaps a bud that never burst open at all. 

            I'll take the cherry blossoms I have in my hand.

            This magazine essay contest is not for me.  Do I regret not going to Paris when I was sixteen? What about all those other decisions on that spinning wheel? Regret? Hell NO. Regret is just a word.

GOING OFF YOUR ANTIDEPRESSANT? EXPECT TO CRY

Recently I decided to go off my antidepressant medication, which I have taken for a long time to treat the free-floating anxiety I've had since college. Why?  Because though a psychiatrist once told me I might have to take it for the rest of my life, I felt the need to be convinced. 

This isn't the first time I've tried this.  In 2014 I spent a month taking less and less of the medication, and was beginning to feel different, experiencing some slight headaches, wondering if I was doing the right thing.  Then, just as I was about to quit completely, my 30-year old son died suddenly in an accident.  The shock and grief were unbearable, and clearly this was not the time to stop taking an antidepressant. 

A few months ago the New York Times published an article about how hard it is to go off antidepressant medication.  (www.nytimes.com/2018/04/07/health/antidepressants-withdrawal-prozac-cymbalta.html)  My doctor told me it must be done VERY slowly -- over many months of decreasing the dose gradually.  And so that is what I have done.

I can report now a touch of anxiety has returned, but so far I am finding it quite manageable.   I have noticed slight mood swings and less patience, again manageable, though a difference from being steady in that regard. But the surprise?  Who knew there was a lot of saltwater collected inside my head behind my eyes?  This apparent and annoying backup of tears is quite leaky, I have found.   I can cry, even sob, easily, quickly and unexpectedly when something, anything, moves me.  It can be a joyful moment or a nostalgic piece of music or a sad memory; or seeing on the news what is happening in my country or the world. Immigrant children! Soccer players trapped in a cave! Trump acts...well like himself!  Next thing I know:  Niagara falls!

So what to do?  I have had to invest in waterproof mascara for the first time since my teens, when I cried all the time over clothes, boys, parents, school, and frenemies. Then it was hormones; now it's apparently living life in my 60's with all that goes with that, but in both cases, to be expected.  Normal.  That is why I stopped taking medication -- I wanted to get back to normal.

Apparently "normal" for me means investing in Kleenex. (sniff!)

THOUGHTS ON BRETT KAVANAUGH

I haven't blogged for awhile, but I've been thinking on the nomination to the Supreme Court for several weeks since Justice Kennedy announced his retirement, making my usual anti-Trump snarky comments on FB and Twitter.  I'm not a lawyer, but this requires more.

Ever since that...er...person became President, we have expected he would be able to nominate a Justice or two.  Painful though it is for us Democrats, we have to acknowledge and admit that we knew this was coming and that thoughtful conservative voters (nice people!) who knew how terrible he is elected him anyway for this single purpose of tipping the Court rightward.  At this point, we should be relieved that the nominee isn't Sean Hannity or Ted Nugent.  Instead, we have a thoughtful, conservative Catholic.

Brett Kavanaugh is a graduate of an awesome Jesuit high school that my son attended, where the motto is "men for others." and instills a lifelong conscience of duty to help the less fortunate. His mother was a teacher, then a lawyer, which tells me, well, he had an awesome mom.  He is a Yalie -- not exactly a place to become Attila the Hun. He served at a high level and met his wife in the Bush 43 White House (which in retrospect is...comforting?).  He is father to two daughters.  All of this makes me think that he may not be as bad as the shouters are convinced he is. Having said that, I expect I will not like or agree with many of his opinions, but I know that they will come from a background I respect and that he will have given thoughtful consideration to his views.

It has never been more true that elections have consequences.  2016's are historic -- the yearning for change that elected Barack Obama mutated into, well -- now we have the worst president since 1776; a Supreme Court that will lean right-wing for several generations; conflict and bewilderment among our allies near and far and manipulation by adversaries; serious and passionate divisions among friends, families and states; and an economy that may fly too high to the sun.  All these things make us weaker and a target for a new 9-11.

No matter what the reasons (and there are many) that the 2016 election went the way it did, for now, we must live with it.  Even if he were to be removed from office, much of the policies will remain the same and the Supreme Court will continue to move rightward as long as the Republicans are in charge.  Marching in the streets and carrying signs and wearing pink hats and arguing with our relatives and friends -- these activities only help a little, and in the case of Maxine Waters and others, may actually hurt our side. The true remedy will be the ballot -- first, in 2018, and more importantly, 2020.  So protest and shout, but more importantly, do what the Parkland kids are doing:  get out and recruit and register voters and help them get to the polls in November. If Democrats get back on top, it will be a tourniquet on the general political move rightward.  But don't expect the Supreme Court to revert to 1960s liberalism.  That time is long gone.

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT....

I wrote this a few years ago so I wouldn't forget the most unforgettable novel I have read in recent decades.  I promptly forgot all about The Goldfinch, and don't know if I posted this anywhere previously, but I stumbled on this today.  I hereby put it out here for anyone who loves literature and hasn't yet read this amazing book.

Loving and Hating The Goldfinch

I thought I was alone when I first thought of Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch as “Dickensian.”  Now that I have finished this 700+ page novel and have looked back at what has been said about this book, I see that many have called it so.  Why is it Dickensian?   We have the saga of a sad, orphaned boy who drifts from adventure to adventure as he grows up, who encounters an assortment of vivid characters along the way, (many with unlikely names like “Hobie”,  “Bracegirdle” and “Kitsey”), a life journey that veers this way and that under the influence of these many encounters as he searches for someone to love and protect him.   We have the portraits of how the rich live and how the poor survive, what brings them unhappiness and what brings them joy, though joy is shortlived for all, it seems.  There is the questionable ethics of heroes and villains alike, an unrequited love.  I could go on.

I loved and hated this book.  It is the first one in my memory not an academic requirement that I finished despite my feelings of sorrow, depression, anger, frustration and disgust.  Practically speaking, the length was daunting and not every chapter was compelling.  Why did I keep reading?  Aside from not wanting to disappoint my book club, and out of respect for its Pulitzer, I kept turning the pages because I had to find out what would happen to the unfortunate young man, Theo.  Without giving too much away,  I will explain a few reasons why he captivated me.

His sadness and loneliness were palpable; yet his inner voice and outer behaviors were fascinating and frustrating in their incompatibility.  Sometimes I wanted to slap him for his wrongheaded actions.  Would he ever finally grow up and get his life together?  Would the painting be his salvation and would he ever be able to restore it to its rightful place?  Would he ever connect with a friend or relative who could show him true understanding and love?  Would he break Hobie’s heart with disappointment?  Would Pippa ever truly see the real Theo?   Would the terrorist attack be explained as anything more than a plot device?  I could go on.

This book is an experience. There were passages of mindblowing writing and philosophical asides that tapped into some of my own ideas about humanity, morality, life, death, the universe.   While reading it has left me with a kind of spiritual exhaustion, it is not because it is all sorrow and pity.  There is the painting.  The author’s use of a famous work of art from 1654 as the cause celebre in Theo’s life keeps straight the thread of his adventures.  His love of The Goldfinch, his mission to protect it, is the most reliable and beautiful fragment of hope in his difficult journey.  The irony of what we learn happens to the painting does not diminish its value to Theo. The idea of the painting, a timeless thing of beauty, is Theo’s life ring.

In the end, it has saved him: 

“Insofar as it is immortal (and it is) I have a small, bright, immutable part in that immortality.  It exists; and it keeps on existing  And I add my own love to the history of people who have loved beautiful things, and looked out for them, and pulled them from the fire, and sought them when they were lost, and tried to preserve them and save them while passing them along literally from hand-to hand, singing out brilliantly from the wreck of time to the next generation of lovers, and the next.”

Bill O'Reilly (and all the others -- you know who you are!)


Does anyone care what I think about Bill O'Reilly? Well I'm going to say something anyway. He takes $25 million as he goes out the door, yet he seems to think he has to defend himself; to maintain he did nothing wrong, perhaps because all he did was grunt and talk dirty. He seems to be part of an ignorant group of men who somehow got the idea that treating a woman in the workplace this way flatters her.; that it's a way to make himself (gulp) attractive. He has lived through the last 50 years in the post-woman's movement world and somehow missed the lesson that treating women like this is bullying; it is insulting; it is bad manners; it is crude and boorish; it is verbal rape. Most women have encountered men like this in the workplace at some point in their lives. It happened to me when I was 22. It was upsetting and unnerving; I blamed myself. Decades later, I remember it so clearly and now I am just...... furious. Women, don't let the Bill O's get away with it any longer. Speak up.

Children and Hate Crimes

There is a song in the Broadway musical “South Pacific” that has the lyric “you have to be carefully taught” and it refers to children learning how to be hateful and racist.  But this idea also refers to teaching them the opposite.  In a beautiful piece that appeared in the Washington Post, titled “Perspective:  With the rise in hate crimes, I’m teaching my kids to be kind, not scared”  It describes kindness as a weapon against racism and hatred.  It describes a world where kindness permeates and spreads, while also recognizing that evil exists across the globe, and that there has been a recent disturbing uptick in racism in our own public marketplace.

This got me thinking.  I don’t remember teaching my children to be accepting and kind.  They learned in parochial school, and they learned by example at home.  I don’t recall lecturing my children about accepting others no matter how different they might be.  I don’t remember telling them that people of other cultures, languages and colors enrich our lives.  I can only imagine and hope that having parents who cared about these things somehow transferred to them by osmosis.  However it derived, I am proud to be the mother of grown kids who have manners, who see the world as a fascinating melting pot that enriches our lives, and where we have an obligation to be kind and helpful to others.

The only proactive thing I remember doing to help them grow up tolerant was to ask my older relatives not to speak their racist jokes and prejudices around my children.  It was hard for them.  They were a product of their time, in the first half of the twentieth century, when people lived in enclaves with others just like them, and learned to fear and even hate those who didn’t match them in religion or ethnic backgrounds.  Some of their prejudices trickled down to part of the next generation, depending on where they grew up.  But their parents, the baby boomers, were far more adventurous about the gains to be achieved by working, living and being friends with those from other backgrounds.  And the majority of the children of baby boomers have become even more tolerant.  Using conservative columnist George Will’s example, “this new generation sees being gay as no different than being left-handed.”

Those of us who applaud diversity and acceptance in our society are in the majority, but you would not know that if you have paid attention to the last year of political activity.  You might think that our new leader has simply made it okay to do and say whatever things most of us used to keep secret.  True, he has unleashed a monster, but the fact is most of Americans are kind and are disturbed by the rise in hate crimes – on either side, for any reason.  Most Americans know the difference between right and wrong, whether or not they were carefully taught.