Book Meme 2012
Week 9: Book(s) that you would bring on your honeymoon. (ie; so intrinsic to your life that it MUST be shared with your life partner as soon as possible. Or just fun to read together.)
For honesty’s sake, if I ever marry I doubt any books will accompany me on my honeymoon. I am a bibliophile, but there is a time and a place for the love of books!
While going over this question in my mind, I realized that there are many books I would wish to share with my life partner as soon as possible, but he would probably not get as far as marrying me without being introduced to them. One book, the Bible, he ought to know before even meeting me. Unless I am mistaken, though, this question is aiming for something very deep and personal.
My hypothetical future husband would not get very far before meeting George MacDonald, P.G. Wodehouse, J.R.R. Tolkien, Jane Austen, Shakespeare, Ellis Peters, or any of my other dear literary loves, assuming he did not know them already. But all of these I would share with any friend. What, then, is so intrinsic to my life that it must be shared with him as partner to my life? What, in short, can he not do without if he would truly know me well?
The only answer is deceptively simple.
He must be introduced to my writing.
In fact, when I think about it, my own work would be the only literature to accompany me on my honeymoon for the simple fact that I am never without it.
I crave someone so close to me that I could open the worlds in my heart. Up to this point in my life, and perhaps forever, no one is allowed into that place. It is holy ground to me. If he should also have such a holy ground to share with me, so much the better.
I would be surprised if other writers do not know what I mean by this. Surely I am not alone. There is something precious and intimate in the source of my writing, and in the writing itself. It alone, of all my literary loves, is intrinsic to my life. Any man who would dare to love me would find that I come with a universe, and there is no separating one from the other.
Heaven help him.
Here are the links to the rest of this series, in order:
1. Motley Crew
5. Shapes are Only Dressess… and Dresses are Only Names
7. Verbage
10. Packing Lightly
jubilare 
May 29th, 2012 at 8:50 am
Good answer! I used to think that I would have to marry a guy who was also a writer, and understood all the stuff that goes on in the writer’s head. Now I’m not so sure. All that I probably really care about is that he thinks it’s cool (as opposed to crazy) that I write, and is willing to contribute feedback.
I don’t exactly know how I’m going to answer the question this week. I may not actually get anything written. I managed to blog through exam week and summer classes, but last-minute trips home for funerals on top of summer class may just kick my butt. Oh well. Or perhaps I shall cheat and write my “Book you have to know if you want to date me” post. Because for me, that might be the real test. Marry the guy and you have the rest of your lives to share things. But winning approval for that first date might be more…subjective.
May 29th, 2012 at 9:16 am
I am glad you approve. Somehow I thought you would. :)
Being ok with me writing, and not thinking me completely insane, is a must, certainly. Being willing to offer feedback and being patient with my obsessive tendencies would be nice. And his hair shall be of what colour it please God. ;)
My condolences and prayers to you. May your butt not be kicked too thoroughly.
That sounds like an interesting post, and I hope you write it whether or not you do it for the meme!
May 30th, 2012 at 10:42 pm
Thanks for your sympathies and prayers. *hug*
Well, I think contributing feedback might go with the territory. “Honey, does this make any sense at all or do I need to rewrite?” Haha, we’ll see. Sometimes when we think we know exactly what we want and need, God still knows better. But clearly our future Beloveds must not think us insane for writing, since writing is something important to both of us (just as we shan’t find Beloved bonkers for whatever interests he has).
May 31st, 2012 at 7:37 am
*hugs*
Heh, true. I’ve come to the conclusion that I am not able to know what would be good for me in a potential partner, or even if such a relationship would be what I need (though I rather hope to have it). The more I know and understand, the more I realize I lack knowledge and understanding. There is a kind of terrifying and wonderful powerlessness in sight that stretches far enough to fail.
May 29th, 2012 at 1:00 pm
“I crave someone so close to me that I could open the worlds in my heart.”
Dang, that is good.
Good answer. I was thinking of writing something similar when I get to this question. :)
May 29th, 2012 at 4:18 pm
What is funny to me is how long it took me to come to this conclusion. I can be rather dense sometimes. :)
June 29th, 2012 at 12:56 am
Most of my Meme answers that are worth anything were discovered in the process of writing the actual post, regardless of what I’d decided beforehand. Some stories work like that, too!
June 29th, 2012 at 7:51 am
True, true. Often the best elements of my stories seem to arise from the moment. I posted about it a while ago. :)
May 29th, 2012 at 1:15 pm
Awesome answer.
May 29th, 2012 at 4:17 pm
*hugs*
May 30th, 2012 at 12:22 pm
If your hypothetical potential husband was from a far-off land, would you make him read the Bible as a prerequisite to courtship, or feed him bits of it at a time so that he wasn’t shocked?
May 30th, 2012 at 12:51 pm
I will not marry someone who does not share my faith, regardless of where he is from. Therefore any hypothetical husband would know the Bible, else he would only be a hypothetical friend.
I love my parents and respect their strong marriage, but I’ve also seen the pain caused by lack of a shared faith. I do not want that for myself.
Also, the Bible is supposed to shock, I think. People who are not shocked are not reading with their whole brains.
May 30th, 2012 at 1:08 pm
That is very sad – I meant more that he might not have had enough contact with Christians if he was, say, west Mongolian to have a chance to become familiar with the religion’s main text. You’d take him if he converted, though?
Not all shock is a good thing…I was wondering if culture-shock would colour it more/be better since it’d make conversion harder and presumably more genuine, to your mind, than being slow-fed it by someone interested in forming bonds.
May 30th, 2012 at 3:55 pm
I am sorry that you think it sad. I have many reasons for this rule, not the least of which is knowing myself well. It is not an adopted rule, nor a whim, but something that has been very carefully and deeply explored.
I cannot say for sure, this being so very hypothetical, but a potential hypothetical husband ought to have his own faith which is not reliant on me. His relationship to God must be his own, as mine is my own. How this hypothetical man’s relationship with God comes about is wide open.
No, not all shock is a good thing, but neither is complete lack of shock.
There’s no formula for what I am talking about. I would not try to convert a man in order to make him a potential husband (that thought sickens me, actually), nor would I throw a Bible at him as a test. Both of those things would defeat the purpose. I do not believe in trying to change someone in order to make them a potential life-partner. If I cannot find a man I want to marry as he is, who wants to marry me as I am, then I would much rather be single. The process by which the hypothetical relationship could occur is beyond speculation until/unless it happens.
June 29th, 2012 at 1:04 am
Deceptively simple, indeed! I still think that newly-married bibliophiles may very well feel the need to bring some books (other than the Bible) along, even if just on principle. Perhaps. But your answer is probably the truest for all of us writers. And the spouse can’t only be introduced to the polished, good stuff we’ve written, but also the spotty, weak, embarrassing stuff as well. Much of that would probably be shared before the actual wedding, but it’s not without the realm of comprehension that two recently-matrimonified writer-lovers might engage in a bit of composition even on a honeyed, halcyon honeymoon. +)
June 29th, 2012 at 9:12 am
Are there pirates in the vicinity?
A book or two might sneak into my bags… my reasoning for not taking books, though, is that I fear them getting in the way of my interaction with the people around me. Heaven forbid I be distracted from hypothetical-husband by an insinuating bit of poetry or prose on the honeymoon. Reading together is one thing, but I know how easily I can be absorbed in solitary study. Surely he would know, by then, that gently removing the book from my hands would neither surprise nor offend me, but it might hurt him that I let myself be absorbed in the first place. :)
I certainly wouldn’t marry a man without making him aware of my writing habit and letting him peruse my work. As for the ugly nuts and bolts at the back of the work, I don’t know. He would probably have to marry me first and be introduced to the process bit by bit as I fight to break down my protective instincts. I’m rather like an amiable dog that has swallowed an armadillo that swallowed a hedgehog that swallowed a locked safe. I am ashamed to say that no one should have to fight through defenses like the ones I have, even with me fighting for his cause from the inside. I think that is why the romance of Eowyn and Faramir resonates with me more strongly than Beren and Luthien. I’m far more open than Eowyn on the surface, but she and I have some unfortunate internal patterns in common. :P
So yes, I would love to co-write and compose things with the hypothetical-future-husband. It’s getting to the point where I could that is daunting!
June 29th, 2012 at 9:43 am
Yes, and a doctor of divinity!
I’ve known other people with defenses similar to yours, actually: my one girlfriend, in senior year of high school, was similarly protective of her stories-in-progress, which she was convinced were too ridiculous for human consumption. Took me awhile after reading part of one to convince her I really did think it was fun on its own merits. For my own writing, I guess I’m not that protective, really. I only show it to writer-friends in the first place, but I really don’t mind any of them reading even the silly, purple-prose stuff I used to churn out, so long as it’s understood in context. None of my close friends are people who mock.
May God help us both in getting to that point!
June 29th, 2012 at 10:19 am
Ho, ho! Ha, ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho, ho!
I envy you, my friend. I hope, one day, to be so open with my writing. It took me years to let anyone read my polished stories. To even be able to write, in the beginning, I had to convince myself that no one would ever see what I set down. I’ve come a long way, but the defenses are still fierce. There are things more closely guarded than the writing, too, which makes me feel sorry for any man who would want to love me. How does a person become so neurotic, I wonder?
Amen!
June 29th, 2012 at 7:19 pm
Lord knows I don’t know! I’m too busy trying to figure out my own weirdness! But don’t worry — we know God is helping us. Just remember that your future man will also have his own things he’s defending and hiding in his heart (we all do), so you’ll probably have to help each other tear down the walls to become one person.
June 30th, 2012 at 10:22 am
It’s a good thing that we can all be weird together. We’d be so lonely elsewise!
I know, and that thought gives me some comfort. After all, if my attention is directed at another person’s walls, my own are a little less defended. I have always been better at helping people bring down their own defenses than I have in letting them help me bring my own down. But with God’s help and a man willing to try, there will be hope.
It’s easy to have a dangerous view of marriage, either over-idealized or over-compromised.
June 30th, 2012 at 7:19 pm
Aye, indeed, and yes.
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