congratulate me.
i finally got on my ass and finished a book.
"life of pi" by yann martel.
it took me 6 additional months, but i picked it up again and decided that it was now or never.
i have to say, i loved it from the zoo to the sea..
and then the interview at the end...
but after the floating island, i thought the shores of mexico came rather abruptly...
nevertheless, martel has a way with words...
i don't know whether it was his or pi's,
but the descriptions weren't boring like "green trees" and "blue skies"...
they're alive and visible...
it's as if i didn't read the story, i saw it...
an excerpt... (here pi is at first struggling to come to terms with an athiest teacher, mr. kumar):
"i was more afraid that in a few words thrown out he might destroy something that i loved.
what if his words had the effect of polio on me?
what a terrible disease that must be if it could kill god in a man.
... He became my favorite teacher... ...It was my first clue that atheists are my brothers and sisters of a different faith, and every word they speak speaks of faith.
Like me, they go as far as the legs of reason will carry them -- and then they leap.
...it is not atheists who get stuck in my craw, but agnostics.
doubt it useful for awhile.
...but we must move on.
to choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation."