Who would have thought that I experienced fire in the building. This is my first time living in an appartement. Of course I never chose appartement when living in Indonesia because it’s a real high risk when the earthquake happen. But here we are placed in an appartement. What got me relieved the first time that we are in the lowest floor so if something happen we will be quickly evacuated. That’s what I thought. Until it really happened. We slept around midnight and abruptly woken up by the noise outside. I thought it was the drunk people just got back from night club or the restaurant next door was doing some deep cleaning. So loud that I had to wake up. My husband peeked outside and immediately said “fire brigade outside, you wait here!” I was just “am I dreaming or what?” I put on clothes, checked outside and saw a few of fire trucks. I checked the other side of the appartement and saw a few of police cars and ambulances. “Oh no, something serious...
It is one of the books that blown my mind. It's very well written and would probably relate with a lot of people who are in their journey to find themselves.
So many people are talking about it but I did not buy it until a few months ago where I read the preview on the first pages. Easy for me to see if I want to buy the book or not. When the first pages hook me right away, I don't need to think twice. This book is one of them.
This contains spoiler of course.
Nora, the main character, like many of us, fall into depression and decided to kill herself. But she's not dead right away. She went into a kind of limbo between life and death. In that library she met a librarian, this librarian is a kind of a guide. Our guide that probably tasked when we were born.
The librarian shows her lives that she could have had if she wants to. She is so depressed and thinks that no life will makes her happy enough to live it. I can totally understand her state. I was there. It wasn't the best.
But eventually she is convinced and tries one by one, the lives that she could probably loves. The life where she met her love of life, where she had a daughter, where she lives her dreams, where she's the proud woman, where she lost her brother, where she had no abusive mother or father. Any kind of different life that she felt. She felt the good and bad ones. Until she is actually losing herself.
Who am I? What do I really want in life? It feels like the one where we have the scenario of “what ifs”. We want different lives with so many what ifs and forget to fight and live the one in the present.
Hundreds of lives she tried, and she felt that she couldn't find the best until the library is almost falling. The quake that happens in the library is showing her that she could die in real life when the library gone. Funny enough, in that very short moment of falling, she wants to live. She finds the courage to live a life that might be one of the glimpse of lives she lived on in the library. It could be, or not, but she finds the courage. She has the courage.
In a matter of seconds, she left the library and found herself in the middle of opening her apartment door and ask for help from her neighbor to save her.
That's when she realized that she was not brave enough to try living the life she wants and dreams of. It can fail of course, but the bravery is something else. As Seneca have said, sometimes even to live is an act of courage.
So, be brave and live your life the way you want it. Never let somebody tells you how to live your life.
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