El libro y el hermano

Three days ago, P's brother lent me his book  - Haruki Murakami's 1Q84. It's three times longer than the average novel. I haven't finished it yet. This is one of the times I wish I don't have anything to do but read. But you don't get everything you wish for.

Notes about P's brother:

• We have the same birth date - twenty seventh of November. 
• He went to seminary school. But he currently teaches History, if I remember correctly, in a high school.
• He once came to class with a big carrier box. His students wondered what was in it. Inside was a piece of chalk. It's kind of stupid but he acted as if you see that kind of thing everyday.
• I think if he was my teacher I would really like him.
• He looks so much like his father.
• We drank brandy and beer when we first met. He was with a friend. There were four of us including P.
• His voice is raspy.
• He once smoked Marlboro Blacks, but he switched to Green Lucky Strikes.
• He's now down to four cigarettes a day.
• He likes Murakami. And he writes as well. When he writes, he has this certain kind of dead pan humor.
• He finished reading 1Q24 in three days. I couldn't top that in my state.

Tony Takitani (2004)

Tony Takitani, a movie from the short story of the same name by Haruki Murakami is dreamlike, lonely, calm. The way it was made, it was like you're reading the story straight from a book yourself. It's comforting especially on a rainy day like this. I don't know. Maybe I just like this kind of movies. Quiet. Sad. 

“There was something odd for him about not feeling lonely. The very fact that he had ceased to be lonely caused him to fear the possibility of becoming lonely again.” 

“I’ve lived the way I wanted to all these years, he thought, and I’ve slept with tons of women. I’ve eaten a lot of good food, and had a lot of good times. There’s not that much in life I’m sorry I missed. Besides, I’m not in any position to complain about being killed. It’s just the way it goes.”

"There were plenty of women around who dressed smartly, and plenty more who dressed to impress, but this girl was different. Totally different. She wore her clothing with such utter naturalness and grace that she could have been a bird that had wrapped itself in a special wind as it made ready to fly off to another world. He had never seen a woman who wore her clothes with such apparent joy. And the clothes themselves looked as if, in being draped on her body, they had won new life for themselves."

“Each day that she spent thinking was another day in hell for Tony Takitani. He couldn’t work. He drank alone. Suddenly his solitude became a crushing weight, a source of agony, a prison. I just never noticed it before, he thought. With despairing eyes, he stared at the thickness and coldness of the walls surrounding him and thought, If she says she doesn’t want to marry me. I might just kill myself.”

“They went on a few dates after that. They didn’t go anywhere in particular, just found quiet places to sit and talk for hours; about their pasts, about their work, about the way they thought or felt about this or that. They never seemed to tire of talking. It was as if they were filling up each other’s emptiness.”

Tony Takitani (2004) Directed by Jun Ichikawa; based from a short story by Haruki Murakami; starring Issei Ogata and Rie Miyazawa; music by Ryuichi Sakamoto