Strange As This Weather Has Been

Leer es aprender. Mi libro de octubre ha sido toda una aventura empezando por el descubrimiento de nuevos nombres: Lace, Bant, Avery & Mogey -- aclaro que el hecho de no tener referencia de género puede causar gran confusión en la trama de una historia. No obstante, dejando a un lado la confusión, la honestidad del texto es lo que me ha captivado.

"Strange As This Weather Has Been" por Ann Pancake es una novela basada en una pequeña comunidad en West Virginia donde conocemos a gente que vive, que sufre, que lucha, que sueña, que cuestiona y que puede apreciar la belleza y el sentir de la pasión por la tierra, su tierra.

Me fascina la prosa casi poética basada en placeres que a veces ignoramos. Hacía mucho tiempo que no leía una frase que se grabase en mi memoria al mismo instante de leerla: Boy and soap. He aquí dos ejemplos de Lace describiendo a Jimmy Make.

"Boy moved down those porch steps like a bobcat, and like a bobcat, he had no idea how he moved, and that made me want him even worse. [..] All these years later, I can still smell that good no-cologne scent of him. Soap and boy."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p11

"I could smell the sun in Jimmy Make's skin, his back, his shoulders, cinnamon brown and freckles both. I'd lie on my side, I'd reach out my tongue. In Jimmy Make's shoulder, I'd taste the sun."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p142

Me conmueven descripciones tan profundas y tan honestas de ciertos personajes. Dane es uno de ellos. No puedo dejar de pensar en él e imaginar los torbellinos de emociones que su pequeño cuerpo contiene.

"Dane is the listener. So he listens, wondering when he'll finally get so full he'll bust have to bust, and day after day he stains, braces, he prays, just to keep from busting. Flood inside."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p47

"His grandma tendered him, did't mind his soft. Didn't hate his softness like Corey does, didn't deny it like Jimmy Make does, didn't ignore it like Lace and Bant do."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p112

Ante todo -- es un libro lleno de realidades. Un libro donde no se necesita acudir al fondo del océano o el final del arcoiris para transmitir sentimientos tan abstractos y tan concretos a la vez.

"Nothing on TV, nothing in books, nothing in magazines looked much like our place or much like us, and it's interesting, how you can believe what's on TV is realer than what you feel under your feet."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p3

"That evening Mom made fried chicken and good thick lumpy gravy, my favorite, and rice and green beans, birthday food, and mine wasn't until March"

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p5

Tal vez sea porque yo también crecí entre los cerros, pero hay descripciones tan hermosas sobre la naturaleza, y el papel que juega en nuestras vidas que sólo nos queda dar una respirada profunda, sonreir y seguir leyendo.

"Now I know people not from here probably don't understand our feeling for these hills. Our love for land not spectacular. Our mountains are not like Western ones, those jagged awesome ones, your eyes always pulled to their tops. But that is the difference, I decided. In the West, the mountains are mostly horizon. We live in ourmountains. It's not just the tops, but the sides that hold us."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p173

Podría continuar citando pasajes preciosos, pero terminaré con un parrafo sobre el sentimiento migratorio del que no puedo escapar y del que siempre me sentiré identificado. 

"It was like everybody walked around with a door in front of their faces, no, two doors, this thick screen door, and behind that, a heavy storm one. And occasionally they'd open the storm door and speak through the screen. But then they'd close the storm door behind them again."

Pancake, Ann. "Strange As This Weather Has Been", p193