A Passive Enduring Love

My father was a writer, so it was a common tradition reading a book on a Sunday. Sometimes I had a good idea about what I wanted to read, and it was easy to choose my next book. Some other times it wasn't, and that's when I asked my father for help.

I don't know if it was a good idea when he recommended me Bukowski and some other authors of that type that he was reading at the time, but I greatly appreciated them and quickly, my fathers recommendations became my favorite books.

One of those authors was Ian McEwan and the first book I read of him was First Love, Last Rites, and that book stuck by me. It became a quick answers to the common question "what is your favorite book?"

One day I was looking for a new book to bury my thoughts of a recent breakup with a long time girlfriend, and I went looking for aid to my father. I told him I wanted something like First Love Last Rites, and he showed me the last book he had just bought, Enduring Love by Ian McEwan. Quickly, I started to read it but I couldn't get pass the first chapter. I was devastated. Although I fell in love with the story, I wasn't ready to read something that intense at that specific moment, so I decided to let it rest for a while.

Two weeks later, I went to dinner with a couple of friends. At the end of the night we went to my house and while we waited for the cab to come pick them up, I showed them my library. They were excited so we started talking about our last read books. When my turn came I told the story about Enduring Love and how it had affected me. One of my friends, trying to help me, took the book without me noticing and then told me later that night.

I understand the good intentions behind her actions, but she didn't know, how could she? That Enduring Love was the last book my father recommended me.

Around that time my father started getting really sick, and year later he passed away. My friend didn't give me the book any soon so I was never able to discuss it with him and tell him how much I liked it. She never knew this part of the story and how important that book is for me.... Not even I had realised it until I wrote this down.