I haven't slept well the last two nights. On Monday I stayed up too late reading The Time Traveler's Wife and couldn't turn my brain off when I crawled into bed. The book mostly takes place in Chicago and just reading the familiar names of the streets, neighborhoods and museums left me missing Chicago so acutely I woke up JP, crawled into his arms and started to cry.
I get affected by the books I read. JP always knows when I'm reading a romance because I'll suddenly need to hear him say why he loves me (the men in those books are wonderfully, unrealistically verbal). And because he does, he always tells me, and I know that I'm living my own love story, made better with its absence of battles and corsets. He knows when I'm reading something troubling or thought-provoking because I stay withdrawn and separate from him, even after I put the book down. Monday night, after four hours of flying through the The Time Traveler's Wife I felt disjointed, like I was split in my component parts and couldn't fit perfectly back together again. I was thinking about living downtown in the city and I desperately wanted it back. But then I thought about my job and my family and I know I couldn't combine those in Chicago as well as I can here in Austin. I thought about a life with no JP and no Landon and me living in a small modern apartment just North of the Loop- working late, meeting up with friends, walking home along the Chicago River- and it fit. Sometimes I think it fits me better than the life I have now.
But then I looked at my sleeping husband, the man who has been the biggest fixture in my life since I was 18 and I can't wish him out of it. Even if he is the reason I'm back in Texas. I thought of Landon. I thought of the children I still want to have, and even right then when time travel and anything else seemed possible, I don't want a life without them in it.
I finished the last 80 pages of the book yesterday at work, stealthily speed reading in my lap under my desk. I went home for dinner and Landon's new daycare orientation and then headed back to the office and worked until after midnight prepping our partners for a hearing on Thursday. My mind was jumbled driving home- I was quite tired, happy about a job well done, and oddly preoccupied with trying to name all of Chicago's downtown north-south streets in order. I was bothered by how much I longed for an urban existence that excluded the two people I love the most.
And then suddenly, in those moments of imagining my alternative life, I understand why I need my career. It's the other part of me, the life I'm not living in the city I'm not in. The challenge, the stress, the sheer separateness it provides from my daily suburban life is why I can be so happy here even though a version of me longs for somewhere else. I've tried to explain to myself why I need to work- why even though I adore Landon, I don't question the time I spend away from him. Not even when JP and I are spinning stories about the future and not even deep down inside when everyone else is asleep. It's why I feel sadness but no guilt at the trade-offs involved in combining work and family. This is how the parts of me fit together. I haven't lost the city girl I discovered when I went to law school and I do love my family as much as I think.
I don't know how long this feeling of peace will last and I don't know if it will make sense to anyone else. JP seemed to understand when I explained it at 2 a.m. but he mostly just wanted me to get under the covers and stop talking. I've debated off and on all morning about publishing this, but maybe one day I'll need to read it again.
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I kind of felt the same way after reading that book. I grew up in Chicago and have never really strayed far from it. All through law school I envisioned staying there to practice law after graduation. But I now know that if I did that, the guy and I wouldn't be able to stay together. Knowing that we're moving to the coast in a short while makes me long for all of the wonderful things I love about Chicago
ReplyDeletewow, great post! And I totally can relate.
ReplyDeleteWhen I'm reading a book I also get so absorbed in it that it consumes me. I've been reading these romance novels and seriously faling in love with fictional men and the adventure parts of the story line make me long for something more than my ordinary life.
I love when you talk about Chicago. I only lived there three years but I feel oddly drawn to the wonferful city. I feel like I left part of myself there. I always thought I would return but when I met my husband I knew I couldn't uproot the life we made in Seattle...I sometimes get frustrated thinking that I should be there in Chicago because it was my plan but I immediately feel guilty thinking about that because I know my family is worth it.
I do the same thing when I read. It completely consumes me, and makes me look at my life as if it were part of whatever book I'm reading. Romance novels always make me sad, because my life is not as unrealistically perfect and fantastic as the characters in the book. Murder mysteries make me suspicious of people around me. It always takes me a couple days to come out of what I've termed my Reading Fog and get back to reality. You are lucky that you have a career that you love to make your life balance. And a husband who loves you enough to give you the reassurance you need, and also enough not to kill you when you wake him at 2am :)
ReplyDeleteDUDE. I watched the movie version on Monday (excellent by the way). I had chosen this book as my first for my book club. I went home on Monday night and almost wrote a very similar post. But then I had 2 screaming babies and it's still in my draft folder.
ReplyDeleteI can't put it into words any better, but I know exactly what you are saying. You're living the right life, because clearly, even though you've had some tough times, you are very happy. The Time Traveler's Wife totally undid me. I loved the book, would rate it in my top ten. But it's not one I could ever read again. Very tough. I also won't be seeing the movie. Best to you.
ReplyDeleteYes, great book. And great post. What a huge benefit of reading -- taking us out of our life and allowing us to look at it from a distance. It could lead to unhappiness, if you have that bent to your personality. But mostly it makes you more you, doesn't it ... I mean, instead of a person living kind of unthinkingly for their job and family.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I appreciate about this blog is your ability to say things I don't relate to (pretty much everything about your job), but in such a thoughtful and heartfelt way that I feel like I understand other people better.
ReplyDeleteDan and I are from opposite coasts and we both think about where we'd be and what jobs we'd have without the other and Becca to "tie us down." I like your description of how you're still you, even with them happily in your life forever.
I'm the person who reads until it's finished. If I haven't finished it in a week I probably never will. No matter how good the book is I'm always sad in the end. The Time Traveler's Wife really was a great read and it certainly helps you appreciate all that you have.
ReplyDeleteI can relate. Even though I've been dating Rick since we met at freshman orientation when I was 17, through college I still imagined that at 26 I'd be working for a firm in New York, living in a tiny apartment in Manhattan, working late and having late dinners with friends and jet-setting when time would allow. (I didn't really think about where Rick would fit into my plans). I NEVER imagined that we'd be married, living in a house near where I grew up, and shopping in the same Target I did when I was in high school for diapers for our toddler. It's still surreal. I do sometimes wonder if we would feel more fulfilled having lived a full single life without marriages and babies and mortgages thrusting us into an early mid-life boringness, but that life seems as far away (and as fleeting) as a novel. I'm convinced that the life that we have is better than the one I imagined.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing.
Ah, us book fanatics. We're quite the crew. I get totally absorbed in a good book and when I force myself to put it down so that I can actually do something useful in the world I often feel disconnected, like I am still living in that other world.
ReplyDeleteI am going to see the Time Traveler's Wife tonight BTW. I had heard the book was really good and I've learned the hard way over the years ... see the movie first, then read the book.
I did that with My Sister's Keeper, by the way. Great movie, totally excellent book. And then I picked up another book by the same author - Nineteen Minutes. Also excellent. You should really check her out if you haven't read her stuff.
Anyway, back to my point (such as it is) - if the book is good and then I go to watch the movie, I always hate the movie. But doing it the other way around it's like a bonus, two different stories for the price of one.
I can totally relate to this post. The constant feeling of, "What if?" Sometimes, I wish I wasn't bright. I am from a small town, where many of my classmates stayed in the small town, got married, had families, and work some basic jobs. They are happy and fulfilled. And I envy them. I envy that they are able to be 100% completely happy and fulfilled with that lifestyle, and never seem to waste their time wondering what life outside of PA is like, or what their life would be like had they gone to college, or not married so young, or...
ReplyDeleteI left the town. I went to college. I went to grad school. I got married. I had a baby. I'm trying to balance it all, and I see their FB status updates, and I feel... jealousy? I'm not sure. I don't know. I just know that I envy people who have the ability to just be satisfied with where they are and not constantly over-think and over-analyze every little thing. I would love to just... be.
"I can totally relate to this post. The constant feeling of, "What if?" Sometimes, I wish I wasn't bright. I am from a small town, where many of my classmates stayed in the small town, got married, had families, and work some basic jobs. They are happy and fulfilled. And I envy them. I envy that they are able to be 100% completely happy and fulfilled with that lifestyle, and never seem to waste their time wondering what life outside of PA is like, or what their life would be like had they gone to college, or not married so young, or..."
ReplyDeleteI totally could have written this post (except for the PA part - LOL). I sometimes really wish I wasn't smart and ambitious because it seems easier than having to think about combining things like work and life etc. Sometimes I think the system lied to "us" - telling us women that we can have it all when we really can't. At least for me (as a big city lawyer) the things I worked so hard for in my early 20s are not compatible with family life as I wish it to be. It would have been so much easier if I only aspired to be average, to have a regular job with a regular life - maybe I could have stayed home (no huge debt!), maybe I could have picked a "woman's" job instead of the law that is more compatible with motherhoold, maybe I would be happier if I didn't always feel like I will never measure up to the childless female lawyers or the male lawyers. I'll stay anonymous for this one... ;)
To the recommendation of checking out Jodi Picoult's stuff I will add one cautionary note. I know lots of people like her stuff, but she frustrates me to no end. She sets up this great moral dilemna and then she has a deus ex machina ending! Which totally cheapens all of the moral struggles in the book, IMHO. So if you think you'd be turned off by that you may want to read it but skip the end. I nearly threw My Sister's Keeper through the wall!
ReplyDeleteAnon at 4:26 pm - I heart you. Ok, that's weird - but just wanted to saw that's a really sweet post.
ReplyDeleteHey, Anon at 4:26 pm here - gee, thanks! Um, I heart you, too? But, seriously, I wasn't really expecting any responses; afterall, this IS LL's blog. But, thanks, ladies (or gents, I guess?) because I think you just made a decision for me. I've been a blog voyeur for a while, and continue to think I would like to start my own, but just lacked the incentive. Actually hearing feedback on a thought was just incenetive enough. I think I may have to jump into the blogosphere full force. So thanks!
ReplyDeleteWendy
Some conceited posts here.
ReplyDeleteWhat's conceited about acknowledging intelligence? It's measurable. And, further, what's conceited when said intelligence is mentioned in a very unboastful way? Please, enlighten me.
ReplyDeleteAnon 4:26 & Lag Liv -- I heart you both
ReplyDelete(late to the party, red the post when it went up... just reread it and wanted to tell LL it was a terrific post, read the comments, rest is history...)
Oh lady do I understand that! And you did a great job putting it into words.
ReplyDelete