I bought Raymond Carver's "Where I'm Calling From" today, on the recommendation of a friend who is known in my life as the literary guru (JAK). I read a few stories, nice ones, ones about the fallcies of the so called "fairy tale" lives that people hope to live. I found it refreshingly honest, wonderful really in the way the characters in each story eke out their places in the world, their ficticious world which so closely mirrors ours.

The boy and I had a revelation too, today, that the famous "fairy tale" doesn't exist in relationships. I think the each of us probably knew it too but talking about it today made everything seem so alright and just worked to confirm what we already might have suspected about ourselves. On top of that, it's nice to come to a mutual agreement that there is no longer any need for nagging insecurities. Nothing to conclude but we love each other and that we're as perfect as perfect realistically gets. It almost sounds like we're settling into middle age; it's hilarious.

The humidity in NYC today was pretty ugly so by the time I got to P&W Sandwich with Jenny I was sweaty and disgusting. It was after lunch that we went off to Labyrinth and incidentally, I ended up buying the Carver book. What struck me, though, is that entire store is a meagre slice of the books that I want to have read by the time this lifetime is through and I haven't been making very good progress. I haven't read Zadie Smith's "White Teeth" nor Roy's "The God of Small Things" and I'm hardly scratching the surface of the authors I even do claim to like and attempt to follow. Didion is one of them, and I've made almost no progress since reading "Slouching Towards Bethlehem." She is due to come out with a new book soon, Jenny tells me, and now with her husband and daughter both dead (prematurely, really), she is alone in the world and will undoubtedly have something to say about death and dying. I have been trying to narrow down lately what it is I like about the books I like, and I've come up with a few interesting themes. I think to a degree anything that puts human relationships, emotions and dilemmas in terms I consider lucid and poignant tend to be the favorite, though anything with an astute observation I generally appreciate.

Now I leave to read. My apartment is set up and allllmooost clean. Pictures when it is clean.