This is why…

6 assignments, 3 exams and the reason I have not been able to write until now…

When i’m not writing, this is why.
I have been shackled to this table writing one assignment after the other after the other after the other. However at 5:00pm yesterday afternoon I submitted the last assignment for the year. *Pause to take in the enormity of this statement…..

When I saw the confirmation of submission come through I sat there in absolute shock.
There really are no words to describe how it feels to sit back after months and months of intense study, stress, assignments, late nights, tears on text books, exhaustion and clinical placement and realise that you’re done, that you got through it, that you made it…

I now have a massive 4 month break and as it is nearly summer here in Australia and the skies are as bright and blue and cloudless as ever, I have a very real feeling that the next few months are going to be nothing less than wonderful.
So today I sit here with B.B King on volume: loud and all the windows are open and I lightened my hair and stocked up the ice in the freezer and in a moment I am going to take the first book on my summer reading list and lie beside the pool and maybe swim, maybe read a little, maybe skip through my music playlist, maybe fall asleep in the sun. I don’t know, but the point is, I can do that now, because for the next 4 months I am free.
So all the things that were once keeping me from writing are now behind me and I plan on writing all summer long.

Before I grab this book of mine and walk to the pool with a smug look on my face I would like to ask you a favour. I love reading. Really, reading is one of the great joys of my life and I have a whole summer to do as much of it as I can before I shelve them again in exchange for text books and another year of study so the favour I want to ask is that you tell me what your all time favourite book is. Because I would like to read it.
So if there is one book out of all the books you have read that you think I should read, please tell me in the comments section below.

In exchange I will give you the one book that I wish everyone would read: ‘The Good Earth’ by Pearl S Buck.
It is a story built around a flawed human being and the teetering socio-economic system of pre-communist China. It holds profounds layers that delve into the human condition…a reminder that we are all so different, yet alike. It is the story of the life of Wang-Lung and O-lan and takes you from poverty to wealth. It explores the humility of the peasants and the excesses of the rich. You are swept away in a world of starvation, simplicity and sheer ‘will to live’ in a country so vast it is almost beyond our comprehension. O-lan is the strongest woman you will likely ever meet and Wang-Lung the most devoted ’tiller of the land’ since creation. I love this book.

Ok, now its your turn.

P.S
Please don’t embarrass me, yourself or literature in general by recommending A) The 50 shades series or B) The twilight series. Cheers.