Throughout my life, there have been a few books that have formed & shaped me.
Harry Potter of course, but there are so many others.
Ella Enchanted, Guy Time (I know, I know), Interviews With Hideous Men and The Baxter Family series to name a few.
But the one I have always felt most connected to, is The Goose Girl.
I've been reading & rereading this book since I was in 6th grade.
Long story short, a young girl is raised to be something she is not, constantly feeling inferior to her mother and the task laid out for her.
By tragic means she is thrown from her position into one far different than that which she has known and in that position, learns who she is as a person.
She gains a gift and a sense of self, which helps her to find her way back & to fill the shoes she felt she could not fill in the beginning.
This book reaches into my heart & takes hold of it.
It makes me want to step out of my comfort zone & try new things, stretch beyond my understanding of the world & to broaden my mind.
We all know what an abomination 2012 was for me.
I've told that tale, we've read that rhyme.
For me, that is the starting point for me.
I hit rock bottom, I could not get and further down.
I'm still desperately trying (& failing) to get back up, 3 years later.
Life is not a fairy tale, it's not a book that must come to a conclusion in 400 or less.
It's a journey.
Lord knows mine has not been an easy one.
But if we look at the world & at ourselves, if we try until we succeed, THAT is where we will find meaning.
We must look for that which makes us our own.
I'm still looking.
Maybe, there will be no Prince to save me from the knife at my throat.
Maybe, there will be no band of friends to back me up.
Maybe, I will just have to stand on my own for a while & figure out who I am.
That's kind of the plan.
If you haven't read it, I (obviously) highly recommend The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale.
But anyways, it's well past my bedtime.
Ciao!
