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Sunday, January 4, 2009

Breathing Lessons Question #3

What parts of the book have made you cry?

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Request: When you reference something in the book, please let us know where it is so we can all read along. Include the chapter number, page number, and the paragraph number. Like this: (C3, P245, G3) Thanks!

6 comments:

Unknown said...

This part didn't make me cry, per se, but it did hurt my heart for Maggie's sake. It was during Serena's husband's funeral and her recollection of the first time they sang together at Serena's wedding. The book says: "When it was time for them to sing, they began at the same split second, on exactly the same note, as if they were meant for each other. Or so Maggie had viewed it at the time" (C2, P76, G 5). Contrasting this memory of the wedding with the present moment of the funeral (some odd years later...) shows the true shift in their relationship: "Ira just sat there. He might be anyone-- a total stranger, someone who merely happened to choose the same pew" (C2, P77, G3).

Rissalee said...

fth: amazing what time does, eh? and then later on, we discover that Ira didn't even sit in and watch the wedding movie, but was in a back room playing solitaire (telling in itself). yet Maggie was her same "idealist" self, moved to emotion from the movie, she makes a move on Ira (to his surprise, but he goes along of course!), but after the interruption "they walked slightly apart, not touching. They were back to their normal selves." (P126,G7)

Rissalee said...

This didn't make me cry, but it brought tears to my eyes, or at least to my soul, for it's a very deep thought and so well-written that I felt Maggie's pain (and the universal pain it describes) through the words on the page:

"But Maggie remembered, and sometimes, feeling the glassy sheet of Ira's disapproval, she grew numbly, wearily certain that there was no such thing on this earth as real change. You could change husbands, but not the situation. You could change the *who*, but not the *what*. We're all just spinning here, she thought, and she pictured the world as a little blue teacup, revolving like those rides at Kiddie Land where everyone is pinned to his place by centrifurgal force." (P48, G2)

Rissalee said...

The scene that unfolds on page 77 and 78 made me sad for Maggie and women like her. And who doesn't/hasn't (even for a moment)have thoughts of "What if?" A different choice here or there, and we'd all be different people. (Or would we?)

She wondered ho he could sit there, so impervious. He'd have let her slog through that entire song alone; she knew that. She could have stumbled and stuttered and broken down; he would have watched as cooly as if she had nothing to do with him. Why not? he would say. What obligated him to sing some corny fifties song at a semi-stranger's funeral? As usual, he'd be right. As usual, he'd be forcing Maggie to do the giving in.

She made up her mind that when the funeral was over, she would stride off in her own direction....

Why, if she had accepted that date with Durwood, she'd be a whole different person now. It was all a matter of comparison. Compared to Ira she looked silly and emotional; anybody would have. Compared to Ira she talked too much and laughed too much and cried too much. Even ate too much! Drank too much! Behaved so sloppily and mawkishly!

She'd been so intent on not turning into her mother, she had gone and turned into her father!

Rissalee said...

So sad...the scene where Ira reflects on Jesse...the "same old song and dance," the "unvaryingness," (P163)...and the whole Harborplace scene.

Rissalee said...

I cried several times from page 278 on...especially times like when Fiona cried out, "I married you for that cradle!" oh, the sadness.