Lost in a Book
Posted by Nona Nita's Blog at 4/21/2009 5:12 PM 
Categories: Nona's Musings, Conscious Living
Tags: seniors grandchildren
Categories: Nona's Musings, Conscious Living
Tags: seniors grandchildren
I almost didn't blog today. I have rediscovered the books on tape section of my library and find myself intrigued once again by The Mists of Avalon, a feat that I would never had had the luxury of attempting if I actually had to take the time to sit down and read the books. The author, Marion Zimmer Bradley, wrote this tale of the legendary Avalon and its influence on the court of King Arthur, in the 1980's and it grew into a series of several books. I had forgotten what fun it is to get completely lost in a story. At the risk of sounding like I have completely "lost it" I will admit that as I walk around the house, hooked up to my earphones, I find myself making comments to characters as if I were in the story with them. "Oh no! I can't believe he said that", or "What a nerve he had", have just flown out of my mouth. Now on Book Three: The King Stagg, I feel like I know the characters very well and in a way, I do, since I have followed them from birth in Books One and Two.
It is sheer escapism at its best, but as I listened to it today, I realized that it is really more than escapism to me. This particular story has always touched a chord in me because the legendary Avalon was a place where women were celebrated as goddesses and where medieval women triumphed over the repression of the male dominated world outside. I have had to be a strong, independent woman often in my life, picking up the slack as the men around disappointed me. Fortunately I have always had the gift of good female friendships to help me along my way. In my 59 years I have come to recognize and respect the inner strength of women, especially when it is needed to fuel the needs of their families and passions. Even though our society is no longer completely male dominated, many women my age grew up feeling like second class citizens, and some of us have had to suffer through a lot of soul searching and growing pains to shake off the early conditioning of being the "weaker sex" that we learned at the hands of misguided teachers, pastors, ad executives, ... and of course, if they didn't make you feel bad about yourself, there was always that Eve and the apple story.
Although I read this series about 12 years ago, I think the story resonates even more with me now after visiting Glastonbury, England on a trip a few years ago. As luck would have it, I found myself visiting during the same week that the town hosted its "Annual Goddess Conference" which drew women
from all over the globe. I was not there to attend their
conference, but I did tag along on their culminating activity, which was to walk to the top of the Tor, singing and bearing fruit to the goddess and dancing atop it. Feeling a bit self-conscious at the beginning, I soon dropped my embarrassment in the company of so many sincere, fun-loving women. I will never forget the wild abandon I began to feel, dancing with all those perfectly wonderful strangers, each with their own reason for being there, but all united in celebrating the beauty, strength and deep bond of womanhood. As one of the medieval characters in the book would have phrased it "Would that I hadn't waited so long to experience this bliss". Come to think of it, I must make a mental note: Remember to tell my granddaughter that she is a goddess and to make sure she grows up believing it.
For more on Enlightened Grandparenting visit Nona Nita's Nook
and click My Path Productions for ideas that support conscious living
It is sheer escapism at its best, but as I listened to it today, I realized that it is really more than escapism to me. This particular story has always touched a chord in me because the legendary Avalon was a place where women were celebrated as goddesses and where medieval women triumphed over the repression of the male dominated world outside. I have had to be a strong, independent woman often in my life, picking up the slack as the men around disappointed me. Fortunately I have always had the gift of good female friendships to help me along my way. In my 59 years I have come to recognize and respect the inner strength of women, especially when it is needed to fuel the needs of their families and passions. Even though our society is no longer completely male dominated, many women my age grew up feeling like second class citizens, and some of us have had to suffer through a lot of soul searching and growing pains to shake off the early conditioning of being the "weaker sex" that we learned at the hands of misguided teachers, pastors, ad executives, ... and of course, if they didn't make you feel bad about yourself, there was always that Eve and the apple story.
Although I read this series about 12 years ago, I think the story resonates even more with me now after visiting Glastonbury, England on a trip a few years ago. As luck would have it, I found myself visiting during the same week that the town hosted its "Annual Goddess Conference" which drew women
from all over the globe. I was not there to attend their
conference, but I did tag along on their culminating activity, which was to walk to the top of the Tor, singing and bearing fruit to the goddess and dancing atop it. Feeling a bit self-conscious at the beginning, I soon dropped my embarrassment in the company of so many sincere, fun-loving women. I will never forget the wild abandon I began to feel, dancing with all those perfectly wonderful strangers, each with their own reason for being there, but all united in celebrating the beauty, strength and deep bond of womanhood. As one of the medieval characters in the book would have phrased it "Would that I hadn't waited so long to experience this bliss". Come to think of it, I must make a mental note: Remember to tell my granddaughter that she is a goddess and to make sure she grows up believing it.
For more on Enlightened Grandparenting visit Nona Nita's Nook
and click My Path Productions for ideas that support conscious living
I have never tried the books on tape but I did splurge recently and bought an Amazon Kindle2 and I absolutely love it. I have always liked reading but books are so expensive and by the time they came out in paperback I had forgotten what I wanted to read. Now that I am back reading it is great. I like you like to get involved in the story.
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I've also become a fan of audio books. I can read them while cleaning house, working in the garden and driving. In fact, I sometimes look forward to cleaning house because I know I'll get to listen to my book!
I read the Avalon books years ago but will have to try them again. For budgetary reasons, I mostly listen to books that are out of copyright and so have become part of the public domain. I download them to my i-Pod from Librivox on the web. I used to be an English teacher, and there are tons of classics I never got around to reading.
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I just finished reading The Great Gatsby again and really enjoyed it. Funny how much you can enjoy a novel when it is not required reading. Thanks for the tip on Librivox on the web!
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