so utterly personal yet universal, it helped me feel understood in the pain of death's horror

A complete 180 from the current pattern of books I've been reading and a worthwhile beginning to a new year of reading. I will be honest, I started this because it is short and I thought I'd be able to finish it before the end of December in order to add another book to my 2022 stats. I continued reading even after 2022 passed because my interest was genuinely captured. Anyone that knows me knows I was hospitalized and near death for two months. That entire period of my life is filled with shame and pain, and to see the outside perspective of a loved one is so different. My mother sat at my bedside while I was dying and continued to support me in recovering from the worst of my chronic illness. Simone de Beauvoir's experience is similar, but also near opposite. She cares for her mother while also being helpless to prevent the inevitable end to her life. I need to do more reading like this to gain wider perspective, I guess this book helped me affirm my place in this world more.

(I took the easy road reading the translation when I should’ve read it in French to fend off forgetting my 6.5 years of language education…)

Song: