We got into Harvard...what, like it's hard?

I am broken. When I bend my fingers the skin over my knuckles cracks open and I bleed. My feet are blistered, new wounds bubbling up where the old have not yet healed. My shoulders, my back, my neck, my legs, my arms, everything aches. My lips are sandpaper. They may never be kissed again. And my eyes, I can barely hold them open. You see, we have been walking these last two days, between cities, through fierce winds and bitter cold (yeah, I know, we've been walking the whole time, but not like this). What could make us sacrifice our bodies in this way, twice (yup, we've walked there twice)? Harvard. Holy grail of the Ivys. Okay, admittedly we could have caught the train from Boston to Cambridge, but then we wouldn't have got to experience crossing Longfellow Bridge and seen the wide expanse of the Charles River frozen below, or spent many happy hours exploring the bookshops and cafes of Mass. Ave and Harvard Sqaure...that and since discovering doughnut flavoured muffins, we reallyneed all the exercise we can get.

The campus is pretty awe-inspiring, as you can imagine. I was kinda lugging my jaw along on the ground behind me as the tour guide pointed out the sights: the gate that Samuel Johnson donated; Memorial Hall, which has the most stained glass of any non-religeous building in the world; the main library (there are many, many libraries) houses over 15 million books and is growing at a rate of six books an hour. All I can say is, thank God for document delivery.

So all this hanging about in Harvard Yard and reading with a look of practised, pensivity while drinking coffee on the Square, has turn my thoughts to literary matters.

While we were lucky to find a hostel in the centre of Boston, that was cheap and provides a great free breakfast, it's not exactly a hive of youthful activity, in fact most of the guests seem like they might have fond memories of the nineteenth century and the place has a nursing home vibe going (tonight the place is buzzing: it's bingo night), but on the plus side, we're getting A LOT of reading done. I've just started F. Scott Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise, which I'm really enjoying, but haven't read enough to comment on in any depth yet. Before that I sank my fangs into Robin McKinley's Sunshine, a vampire romance (oh, the irony!). Yeah, turns out not even Harvard could cure me of my love for the suckers. For those of you out there who share my guilty pleasure, be sure to get your hands on this one, if you haven't already--Jess, I especially thought of you when I was reading it. The main character (the girl, not the vampire, obviously) works in a bakery making cinamon scrolls for a lovably quirky cast of regular customers by day, while being drawn into the vampiric underworld by night. The heroine spent a lot of time consuming baked goods, drinking, lying around in pools of sunlight and being excorted out of danger and tucked up in bed and watched over by the terribly well-spoken, gentlman-like, yet still totally mad, bad and dangerous to know, vampire hero. And while the feminists among you are more than justified in wanting to stake me for it, after all these weeks of being cold, literally taking on the worldand being all independent and responsible, days of tea, cinamon buns and warm sunlight and a vampire wanting to get all broody and protective over me, is VERY appealing (oh, come on, it's a vampire romance, you just know he's going to need to puny human to save his arse in the big battle). A real hot chocolate read!

Right, now must get back to being engrossed in This Sideof Paradise before one of the Harvard people catches on that I'm going gooey over suckers rather than writing an incredibly profound response to something Fitzgerald wrote!

Tomorrow we're off on a day trip to Concord to contuinue our American literary adventures!

Love,
Margs

xo xo xo