I Love the Smell of Books

Today I finished a book, for the first time in quite a while. It felt amazing to finish reading on the last page, close the book, and add it to my overflowing bookshelf. It was, Things I Have Been Silent About by Dr. Azar Nafisi. I received this book, as well as her first, Reading Lolita in Tehran, for my birthday almost a year ago. I wasn't given these books as a way for my parents to show me how self-absorbed we Americans can be, and how ungrateful we sometimes are about the liberties we have and abuse or completely disregard. I was given these books because my family knew that my next paycheck would be going to their purchase anyway.
I had never heard of Dr. Nafisi, or, in complete honesty, of Tehran until Spring Break at the end of last March. I was present at the 2010 Sigma Tau Delta (The International English Honors Society) Convention where Dr. Nafisi spoke. (And yes, the honors society I was a part of in college had the initials STD. And yes, we are proud of that :P) I fell in love with her words, her wisdom about standing up for literature even when everyone is telling me, and us, that we are fools for "wasting our time" with it. For her, it was her escape, as it is for me and countless others. This is how we learn to cope with our world, to live in our world, by the examples, triumphs and mistakes of our favorite characters.
But what reading these books introduced me to, was my selfishness. I never knew where Tehran was, or that it even existed. It is the capitol of a country much older than my own, and I couldn't have even guessed where to start looking for it had I been given a map last February and asked to point it out. What does this say about Americans, about American students? I am proud to be an American (And no, I didn't mean that to come out as corny as it just did.) However, I think we have some very large faults which are becoming more and more apparent now that we are far more globalized and much more interconnected (Thank you World Wide Web). At one point in time the US was the baby, the toddler whom the world was watching to see if it fell on its face. Then it grew to a power house, a force to be reckoned with. But we seem to have outgrown that stage as well. Much like a high school football player reliving his glory days well into his thirties and forties, we are becoming the butt of jokes as the has-been who believes we cannot be surpassed. While I don't mean to sound so political, that is certainly not where I intended this blog to go, but it seems to have a mind of its own... I do believe we can do better. I learned at a lecture last year that in the next few years (I cannot remember specifically how many, but not  too far into the future) India will become the largest English speaking nation. A country where there are literally hundreds of other languages spoken as well. Can you imagine?
Something happened to me at work that fits this scenario perfectly, I work at a fast-food restaurant (Thank you Bachelor's degree in English...) where there are a lot of Brazilian workers. One of my current goals, other than to write this blog, is to learn Portuguese so that I can better communicate with my crew. I mentioned this to one of the managers that I am really excited about learning the language, seeing as I was a failure at High School French. Her response was, "Why? They should all be speaking English, this is America. We speak English here." It just amazes me the closed-mindedness of people. I love to learn, always have, and always will. And being able to explore new cultures and languages is something I have always been interested in, but there are so many people I know who are completely content on never leaving the states, hell never leave this state for that matter. It just confuses me. And saddens me that we are starting to plateau. I guess the latest fashion in the US is horse-blinders.

I created this blog over 6 months ago when I thought I needed to announce my problems and my every move to the world. Then I never did anything with it. It has been sitting here collecting virtual dust ever since. The electronic book pages yellowing over time. But I can't deny my love of writing any more. Let me tell you a little about myself, I am a college graduate who is now living at her parents house. In less than a month is will have been a year since I received my Bachelor's degree. And what have I done with it? What have any of my fellow graduates done? Some ran off to graduate school to hide, while others were able to shoehorn their way into the education system. And here I am, trying to float on an ice cube in the ocean during this economic hurricane. And the ice cube is melting pretty damn fast.
Like so many others in my generation, I have been sitting on facebook watching my world change, watching the people I went to High School and College with move on with their lives, and announcing every move, breath, and tear to the world. And I think it's crap. I hate that people announce their every move. And yet here I am, another victim of wanting someone else to appreciate and validate my life, my writing, my humor, my humanity. That's why I it took me so long to put my words here. I keep a journal where all the truly horrifying facts are. But this is different. I want to be able to explore the world we live in through the insanity that I experience. I want to see people connect through a shared vision of the world, apparently through my vision of the world. Or at least my vision of my backyard.
And now since I'm starting to babble I guess this particular blog post is over.
Thank you for reading, if you actually make it this far.