A while ago a good friend of mine recommended that I read Through Painted Deserts by Donald Miller. I remember that being during my 5th year of college when I was completing my thesis. I was working in my studio from 8am to 2am so, needless to say, I wasn't doing much reading at that time. Fast forward to just before Christmas, I find the book in the picked over remains of a bookstore's going out of business sale and I'm pleasantly surprised. I accumulated several other books around the same time, but Through Painted Deserts was the book I decided to start off the new year with. I'm so glad I did.
"The seasons remind me that I must keep changing, and I want to change because it is God's way."
There are several times in the year that I feel the urge to reinvent myself. The beginning of the year, the spring, the fall. There's something about the seasons that bring that out in me, especially the spring. This sentence really called out to me when I read it.
"I want to keep my soul fertile for the changes, so things keep getting born in me, so things keep dying when it is time for things to die. I want to keep walking away from the person I was a moment ago, because a mind was made to figure things out, not to read the same page recurrently."
The book is a memoir about Donald Miller's road trip from Texas to Oregon in an old Volkswagen Van. He and his friend Paul experience the country without the distractions of everyday life, with barely enough money to reach their destination, and Donald continues to question "why?". They discover what's really important in life, and what it's like to desire only the simple things. It made me crave a life without anything holding me down. Sometimes I really feel like if I had the opportunity to just get up and leave I would. Working odd jobs anywhere just to experience all this life has to offer. I have a love/hate relationship with books like this for that very reason. I loved this book. There isn't much else to say.
"You're a pretty good person, you know. God made a whole beautiful earth and decided to put you in it, to experience all of this beauty. You can't do that watching television all the time."
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This week I started Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes. I read about half of one of her books last year but lost interest in it for various reasons. I'm only a few chapters in, but finding myself much more interested in this one. A story about buying an abandoned home in Tuscany...sigh.
(The books are sitting on the bench we are working on...consider it a little sneak peak.)
Through Painted Deserts is phenomenal. I think I read it somewhere around 2004/2005ish. Goodness what a good read.
ReplyDeleteI actually just started another of his this week, "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years". Good read so far, that's for sure.
And final food for chewing on, they just finished shooting on Blue Like Jazz, the movie.
I'm really excited to read Blue Like Jazz at some point. I'll have to do it before the movie comes out.
ReplyDeleteReally? You've never read it?
ReplyDeleteLife itself will become more vivid after reading it.
It's that good.