Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

Since my studies have taken a hiatus (I'm only taking one class until May, and then I have the summer off) I have had so much more time to read books that have nothing to do with audiology or deaf education. And let me tell you, it has been SUPERB.

I came back to New York after Christmas with five new books in tow and then was also given a book by Becky who makes a habit of passing on books once she is done with them (a habit I have selfishly not been able to pick up due to my love of having a book collection). I zipped through Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games (a quick, fun, sci-fi young adult read) and Steig Larsson's The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest (I heard this was everyone's favorite but I still think I preferred the first book The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo).

As of now, I'm in the middle of Becky's pick: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, about a young boy who travels the boroughs of New York City to find the matching lock for a key that his deceased father left behind. Like I said, I'm only halfway through but I am loving it so, so much. It is at once funny and sad, quirky and nostalgic, sensible and confusing. I have no idea where the plot is going or even what the point of it all is, yet I find passages each night that I feel the need to mark and remember because they make me laugh, frown, or think. Safran Foer's writing is wrapped in so many different characteristics that I wouldn't even know what type of writer to label him as. Either way, I'm taking down the quotes I want to remember as I go, as listed below.

Quotes

"Well, what I don’t get is why do we exist? I don’t mean how, but why.” I watched the fireflies of his thoughts orbit his head. He said, “We exist because we exist.” “What the?” “We could imagine all sorts of universes unlike this one, but this is the one that happened." [13]

"Just because you’re an atheist, that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t love for things to have reasons for why they are." [13]

We laughed and laughed, together and separately, out loud and silently, we were determined to ignore whatever needed to be ignored, to build a new world from nothing if nothing in our world could be salvaged, it was one of the best days of my life, a day during which I lived my life and didn’t think about my life at all. [28]

Our laughter kept the feathers in the air. I thought about birds. Could they fly if there wasn’t someone, somewhere, laughing? [78]

When Dad was tucking me in that night and we were talking about the book, I asked if he could think of a solution to that problem. “Which problem?” “The problem of how relatively insignificant we are.” He said, “Well, what would happen if a plane dropped you in the middle of the Sahara Desert and you picked up a single grain of sand with tweezers and moved it one millimeter?” I said, “I’d probably die of dehydration.” He said, “I just mean right then, when you moved that single grain of sand. What would that mean?” I said, “I dunno, what?” He said, “think about it.” I thought about it. “I guess I would have moved a grain of sand.” “Which would mean?” “Which would mean I moved a grain of sand?” “Which would mean you changed the Sahara.” “So?” “So? So the Sahara is a vast desert. And it has existed for million of years. And you changed it!” “That’s true!” I said, sitting up. “I changed the Sahara!” “Which means?” he said. “What? Tell me.” “Well, I’m not talking about moving that one grain of sand one millimeter.” “Yeah?” “If you hadn’t done it, human history would have been one way…” “Uh-huh?” “but you did do it, so…?” I stood on the bed, pointed my fingers at the fake stars, and screamed: “I changed the course of human history!” “That’s right.” “I changed the universe!” “You did.” “I’m God!’ “You’re an atheist.” “I don’t exist!” I fell back onto the bed, into his arms, and we cracked up together. [86]

I shook my tambourine the whole time, because it helped me remember that even though I was going through different neighborhoods, I was still me. [88]

Songs are as sad as the listener. [108]

I like to see people reunited, maybe that’s a silly thing, but what can I say, I like to see people run into each other, I like the kissing and the crying, I like the impatience, the stories that the mouth can’t tell fast enough, the ears that aren’t big enough, the eyes that can’t take in all of the change, I like the hugging, the bringing together, the end of missing someone… [109] (This one is for Dylan, as he is talking about watching people at the airport...)

...Literature was the only religion her father practiced, when a book fell on the floor he kissed it, when he was done with a book he tried to give it away to someone who would love it... [114] (This one is for Becky)

She asked, "Aren't my life and my feelings the same thing?" [130]