Geisha

I finished reading Memoirs of a Geisha tonight. It really was beautiful - difficult and painful for me in many ways - but beautiful. There were a number of quotes near the end of the book which I underlined. I'm really not sure if they'll mean as much to someone reading them out of context, but I'm still compelled to share them in this forum:

"Adversity is like a strong wind. I don't mean just that it holds us back from places we might otherwise go. It also tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn, so that afterward we see ourselves as we really are, and not merely as we might like to be."

"In these years away, I'd learned to suspend all the water in my personality by turning it to ice, you might say. Only by stopping the natural flow of my thoughts in this way could I bear the waiting. Now to hear Nobu refer to my destiny...well, I felt he'd shattered the ice inside me and awakened my desires once again."

[The discussion of a "water personality" throughout this novel really intrigued me. Perhaps because water plays such a HUGE part of many of my dreams. The concept is apparently based on the Japanese philosophy that different people are more in tune with different elements of the Earth (earth, fire, water, metal and water) and the heroine of this story had a strong water personality. Here's something I found on the web about a water personality: Water-type people are smart, wise, frank, and resourceful. They have good memories and think before they leap.There are two types of Water: Floating Water and Still Water. Floating Water makes people active and restless and feel like traveling. Still Water makes people calm and peaceful.]

There were two other lines I'd underlined, but they were more personal and seemed less apt to speak to a broad audience (how presumptious of me to even consider that I have a broad audience!). At any rate, I'm very glad I decided to read this book. Probably the best $1.00 I've spent in a long time. Half Price Books really is lots of fun. Next on the book list is either Eragon or Vanity Fair. Guess I'll decide in a few minutes when I lie down to rest.