#21

Book #21 is The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein.  Let me be clear.  I did NOT want to read this book.  I don't like reading dog books.  The dog ALWAYS dies {except in Gordon Koman's No More Dead Dogs ~ which sums up my feelings exactly}.  I hate it when the dog dies.  It's the worst part about having a dog.  They steal your heart & stomp all over it ~ why would I read about it and rip those scabs right open?
BUT, it was recommended to me by numerous sources...and I don't like to miss out on a good thing...so peer pressure won.  I don't want to ruin it for you, but the dog dies, as is made perfectly clear in the first chapter...no surprises here.  But it is such a good story.  It is worth reading.  Enzo, the dog, is the narrator & tells us the story of his master & family.  We learn the ups & downs of life & death and love & loss.  So many great characters, the best being Enzo.  I found myself looking at Tonka & Fonzi differently.  Dogs certainly become part of the family...but how much DO they know?
Lots of good quotes:
p41 ~ That which you manifest is before you.   {Pretty much the theme of the story...and an interesting way to look at life.  My summary ~ poor as it may be ~ that which you believe to be true, is.
p74-75 ~ But I am a racer at heart, and a racer will never let something that has already happened affect what is happening now.
p80 ~ favorite word

p102 ~ Pretend you are a dog like me and listen to other people rather than steal their stories.  {I should TATTOO this on the inside of my eyelids for constant reminders}

p141 ~ Beware the whimsy of Fate...She is a mean bitch of a lab.

p160 ~ "Today is the first day I am not dead," Eve said to us.  "And we're having a party."  To live every day as if it had been stolen from death, that is how I would like to live.  To feel the joy of life, as Eve felt the joy of life.  To separate oneself from the burden, the angst, the anguish that we all encounter every day.  To say I am alive, I am wonderful, I am.  I am.  That is something to aspire to.  

p198 ~ Did he despair?  Did he silently berate himself for allowing himself to be in that situation?  Or did he finally realize what it is like to be me, to be a dog?  Did he understand, as those interminable minutes ticked by, that being alone is not the same as being lonely?  That being alone is a neutral state; it is like a blind fish at the bottom of the ocean: without eyes, and therefore without judgment.  Is it possible?  That which is around me does not affect my mood; my mood affects that which is around me.  Is it true?  Could Denny have possibly appreciated the subjective nature of loneliness, which is something that exists only in the mind, not in the world, and, like a virus, is unable to survive without a willing host?

p235 ~ You should shine with all of your light all the time.

fl: Gestures are all that I have; sometimes they must be grand in nature.  And while I occasionally step over the line and into the world of the melodramatic, it is what I must do in order to communicate clearly and effectively. ll: "Si," he says.  "The car goes where the eyes go.  It is true, my young friend.  It is very, very, true."