extremely amazing

last night, at coolidge corner, i went to see jonathan safran-foer do a reading from extremely loud & incredibly close. i didn't have tickets, so i waited in the standby line, and an older woman sold me her extra ticket. i was tickled pink. the event was held in the big theater downstairs, and it was almost completely full.
the reading was amazing. absolutely brilliant. i think that jonathan read the passages in the exact way that i had imagined them in my head... you could definitely tell that he had put a lot of his own personality into the character of oskar. in the novel, if you haven't read it, there are a lot of wonderful photographs placed throughout. while jonathan was reading, these images were projected onto the movie screen as they appeared in the text. this had a wonderful effect, as many of the photographs are... very strong images. it was beautiful. jonathan read very clearly, and gave the characters their own personality, so you could tell that he was very close to the novel (or, rather, that he had done this a million times). at the end, i was very heartsick, and also very pleased. i know that i need to read the novel again... it is such an enormous work, in my mind.
after the reading, everyone crossed the street (imagine, 200 people flooding out into the crosswalk) to the brookline booksmith to have their books signed. i had brought my mother's hardcover copy along with me, but decided to purchase a paperback copy for myself as well. when you purchased a copy of the book, they gave you a key that you could try in a lock. if your key worked, you won a prize (framed prints of images from the book, a paper sculpture made out of a copy of the book by JSF himself)! having bought my copy and recieved my little key, i waited in line for 1.5 hours (!) and got my book(s) signed. i always get sort of flustered at these things, so i just sort of babbled about why my mother's name has an 'e' in it, and how a lot of golden retrievers are named chessie. he was very sweet, and looked absolutely worn out in a very precious sort of way. it was first class. sadly, my key did not work in the lock, but i kept it anyway, just for pack-rat's sake.

i really wish my mom could have been there to experience it with me. she would have enjoyed it so much, and she is the one who lent me the book in the first place.

overall, things are going amazingly well. i had my first final this morning, rock music, and i think i did rather well. tonight there is a kickball game in the fens, filled with lots of music, and booty shorts, i suspect. i am going home in exactly a week.
c.