The Useless Days Will Add Up to Something

I made my way to the Harvard Bookstore Wednesday night for a reading by Cheryl Strayed, promoting her new book Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar. Although I could undeniably use such advice (considering I spend most Saturday nights alone on my couch), I mainly went hoping she would talk about Wild, her memoir on hiking the Pacific Crest Trail (and her spinning-out-of-control life that compelled her to do it). I wasn’t disappointed; she read and discussed both books, and it was definitely worth standing in the hot and crowded back room of the store for an hour and a half.

She first greeted us by saying Boston holds a special place in her heart. I immediately assumed she said this to every city she visits, but I think I actually believe her now. To begin with, she was in Boston on her spring tour when she first got the call that Wild landed on the New York Times bestseller list. I can’t speak from experience, but I’m guessing that’s a moment not many authors forget. And then later that day after she completed her reading and opened up the floor for questions, an older gentleman in the front row shot his arm in the air. “Have you ever had sex in exchange for food?” She said the audience went silent (unlike ours), not knowing how she would respond. She answered, “No, but do you want to get dinner tonight?” Turns out he already ate. So now she begins each reading with this little story, and she said being back in Boston feels like she’s back at home.

She managed to read from and talk about both of her recent books because, as she explained, both address “all the different things we grapple with: grief, love, confusion, kinky sex…”

Perhaps I should explain. For those of you who have not read Wild (you should), it’s a brutally honest, humble, humorous, and charming memoir on a twenty-six-year-old’s adventure of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail and all of the reasons she decided she needed to try (her beloved mother’s sudden death from cancer, her desire and decision to sleep with men other than her husband, her subsequent divorce from her husband, her experimentation with drugs, her lack of direction in life, etc.). She needed to get away and clear her head—and what better way to do that than to literally almost kill herself by backpacking 1,100 miles with absolutely no previous hiking experience.

Tiny Beautiful Things, a collection of articles from her advice column “Dear Sugar” on The Rumpus, also grapples with the list of things above. As she read through a few articles, the one that struck me the most was her answer to one reader’s question What would you tell your twenty-something self?

• “You’re not fat. Or rather, you’re sometimes a little bit fat but who gives a shit?”
• “Understand that what you resolve will need to be resolved again. And again.”
• “The useless days will add up to something. The shitty waitressing jobs… The long meandering walks—” (this is where she paused to tell us all 336 pages of Wild were summed up in this phrase) “—the hours…wondering about sex and God and whether you should shave under your arms or not…”
• "...you believe you no longer have a right to such tiny beautiful things. You're wrong. You do."

Strayed admitted she was surprised to find this book in the self-help section, but I can see it serving that purpose. And I will definitely be adding Tiny Beautiful Things to my “Currently Reading” list (because hey, a little humorous but down-to-earth self-help advice never hurt anyone). 

I had to opt out of getting my copy signed... seeing as I bought the Kindle edition
and didn't want to ruin it with a scratched-in signature of some sort.
But she was extremely kind and friendly to every fan.