This Summer's Good Reader

It’s June already!
Don’t you think its quite funny how time flies?

I woke up lazily this morning, June 1st, and clicked on the TV to find a talkshow segment in tvone about the Pussycat Dolls concert in Jakarta, scheduled for tomorrow night. These sexy cats and dolls arrived last night straight from Down Under. Even though I won’t watch PCD live on stage, somehow watching them smile and all to the cameras made me feel a bit relaxed and strangely relieved. So I guess Indonesia is now officially out and off of the travel warning list by the U.S. of A.!

On the sidelines, June also marks the beginning of the sunny months. It’s summer, people! Welcome the warm and more often than not, hot days!

Summer is also the time to attach myself with one of my favorite activity: reading of as many books as possible, before the monsoon begins and then it’s much more tempting to sleep under my thick blanket than reading any (good) books.

I’ve already finished my first novel of this summer; it’s “The Catcher in The Rye” by J.D. Salinger. I believe you know what it was all about, so I’d rather not say anything. Looking at my short bookshelf this morning that is now over-occupied by too many books, somehow I really get excited about months to come.

I plan to finish “More About Nothing” by Wimar Witoelar tonight. He’s my best friend’s father in law. I saw in his Facebook profile this morning that he’s going to be a guest at Pagi Jakarta next Thursday. Mark the calendar. I’m curious whether he can beat Erwin Parengkuan again this time at his own show, just like the last one when they talked about Citizen Journalism.

There are also some children’s books I just bought from a sale in Grand Indonesia yesterday; ranging from “Spring-Heeled Jack” by Philip Pullman, to some Astrid Lindgren’s. These books are going to be my summer reads, obviously. Summers are intended for pop and leisure and fun, aren’t they?

What about you, friends? What books are going to be on your bedside table? How about in your beach bag? And what about the one(s) you’re going to bring with you on vacation? How many books do you think you can finish before the monsoon begin?

Let’s challenge ourselves! Be one of this summer’s avid book readers!

At The Section of Forgotten Toys

At the section of forgotten toys
There is a lonely plastic doll in the form of a little girl
Standing alone inside its original wrapping
Still smiling even though its box are covered with dust and its colors gradually fading

It has been abandoned for almost all of its shelf life
Nobody wants any business with it but a little crippled girl
Who once visited the big toy store along with other similar looking children
Has only one arm, or one leg, or simply can not walk and has to be pushed away in wheelchairs

The little crippled girl picked the box with the plastic little girl doll standing alone inside
Her face gleamed with happiness and smile
“Hey, little pretty doll, how are you doing today?”
“My name is Molly and from now on, I want you to be my friend.”

But a grown up woman’s hand picked the box up from Molly’s hands
And return the plastic little girl doll to the shelf along with other plastic toys,
“Not this one, Molly. Because you are allowed to have a more beautiful doll than this.”
And ushered the little crippled girl away

The lonely plastic doll can not remember how long it stays on its shelf
Until one day a big hairy hand grabbed its box and throw it into the small steely cart
Where it stuck on the top and piled up with other deformed boxes of toys
And pushed away into the little dark room where the lights are seldom switched on
And there’s no blowing breeze from the air condition
Where the lonely little plastic girl doll remains untouched
For days, months and eventually, years

At the section of forgotten toys
There is a lonely plastic doll in the form of a little girl
Standing alone and yet it keeps smiling
Because it still remembers Molly,
The little crippled girl who hand-picked and kissed her box
And told her that she wanted to be her friend
Before she was ushered away