bookish

Books exercise a powerful magic. I've been caught in their spell for longer than I can remember. Growing up I read everything from cereal boxes to the classics. I devoured books. When I read, I wasn't reading about other people. I was another person--Laura Ingalls, Sara Crewe, Anne Shirley. I think that's what reading and travelling have in common--they allow one to live someone else's life for a little while.

Recently I read Grey is the Colour of Hope. It's a memoir chronicling a Russian poet's life as a political prisoner in a Russian prison camp. She spent time in prison and then was subject to internal exile for a time after her release from the camp. (This was common.)

Maybe I've been identifying too much with the poet, Irina Ratushinskaya. ;> I'm feeling a little like I'm serving a sentence of internal exile.

*I haven't heard of any opening at the school I want to return to in the US. It's not surprising, I suppose. It's a great place to teach! Happy teachers stay put. I really praying that God sends me back there soon.

*My adoption is at a standstill. If I leave now, I will have to re-do my homestudy again. Not only will that be time consuming, it will be expensive.

*We're on the verge of accreditation being updated...we think. That means that it's important that I be here over my upcoming spring break. Of course, it was also important that I be here last summer and over fall break and Christmas break. With the agency slowing things down, it feels a little like a pardon appeal has been denied.

So, here I am and, for now, here I stay.

It's not a life sentence. It's not even SHIZO ("punishment isolator") because a friend is coming to visit on 5 April. I do like St. Petersburg. It's a beautiful, historic city! My car is working again, so I'm feeling more mobile and less imprisoned. (New battery, a good tank of gasoline and a water remover treatment along with warmer weather did the trick after six weeks biz machina.)And now the sun is back and temperatures are steadily climbing. So, really, things are good.

I think I'd better read something light and fluffy to banish the prisoner-mentality. (Children of Glastnost, by the wife of a former Canadian ambassador didn't help. I thought the opening of the Soviet Union might dispel the prison camp, but it didn't. I don't think her experience in Russia is typical or representative of the population as a whole. Also it's dry. Don't bother with that one. So, since that book failed utterly to spring me, I'm prescribing a course of light and fluffy.) Unfortunately, I've read all my light and fluffy books. Now I'm working on Isabella: She-Wolf of France and Queen of England. I don't know anything about her, so this is a good way to occupy my mind. So far, so good. And, following your suggestions, I'll add Rebecca to my next Amazon order. (I thought I'd read it ages ago, but then couldn't recall the plot...so even if I've read it, it needs re-reading.) Abracadabra!