{"id":6745,"date":"2007-06-27T15:02:46","date_gmt":"2007-06-27T19:02:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=6745"},"modified":"2024-10-27T15:11:07","modified_gmt":"2024-10-27T19:11:07","slug":"inscriptions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=6745","title":{"rendered":"Inscriptions"},"content":{"rendered":"

I love the site Book Inscriptions Project<\/a> dearly – so glad I discovered it! I love to just scroll through there, reading, perusing – it makes me feel like I’m snooping, or something. Maybe that’s part of the appeal. But it’s not just that.<\/p>\n

I have some second-hand books that come with random inscriptions (the one from 1912<\/a> is my favorite) – and there are a couple of books in my own collection with inscriptions that have huge capacity to transport me back in time. Antonio and I always used to sign the books we gave to each other – so there they remain, in my collection – ghosts of that relationship, years and years gone by.<\/p>\n

The book that really ‘got us together’ was The Accidental Tourist<\/i> by Anne Tyler – Antonio was reading it that summer, and he gave a copy to me to read, before we even started officially dating – and wrote in it (in response to a joke I had made, I guess), “No. We are not just two attitudes bouncing off of each other. Tonio.” There was something about that book – and its portrayal of an unconventional woman, and a quirky relationship – really spoke to him, and made him see me in a new way (his words). We had known each other forever – and it was as he was reading Accidental Tourist<\/i> that the thought occurred to him …. what about Sheila?<\/p>\n

I remember reading that inscription and feeling a little crinkly thing in my stomach, like: hmmmm, this FEELS like something is there … Am I reading into that inscription? Or .. is he saying there is more between us than just jokes and banter?<\/p>\n

I always think I’m reading stuff into everything, but the thing is: I am usually right. My instincts have rarely been off – even when friends have tried to say, “You’re being paranoid”, etc. Nope – I know. (The weirdest example of my intuition being here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

The gift was symbolic – and I still have it – inscription and all. Strange. None of the feelings remain from that time – he’s one of the few guys I DID get over with no lingering regrets – so when I look at that inscription I feel strangely distant, and poetic almost. Like – wow. Look at that poetic thing that happened to someone else. Look at that poetic romantic thing that means nothing to me.<\/p>\n

Snippets, fragments of humanity, of connection – missed or otherwise- Human beings writing to each other, to themselves … I don’t know, I find it very touching – like Dr. Frank’s ongoing found objects series. latest here<\/a>. Or this one<\/a><\/p>\n

There’s something about The Book inscriptions project <\/a>that really speaks to me. Hieroglyphics, remnants, ghosts, echoes … and yet oh how important these messages were to someone, once upon a time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I love the site Book Inscriptions Project dearly – so glad I discovered it! I love to just scroll through there, reading, perusing – it makes me feel like I’m snooping, or something. Maybe that’s part of the appeal. But … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[634,2485],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6745"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6745"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6745\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":181023,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6745\/revisions\/181023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}