So I am fully stoked to have an audience (you) to listen to me crap on about how much I enjoyed this book. It is a wonderful memoir, pause and reflect intelligent, a wee bit sad and a shit load of funny.
Ages ago, I asked Corinne Grant to complete the Glass Half Full Challenge in WoogsWorld, Which she did in spectacular fashion. Read it here. And I always knew she was piss your pants hilarious on the box, but what I did not know what she was a shit hot writer to boot.
OK, so enough with the brown nosing.
"Corinne, what in Christ's name am I holding?"
Do you know what a hoarder is? You would if you watched Oprah a bit more. Oprah actually has an Aussie Expert called Peter Walsh who comes in and sort them out. Hoarders usually live in places that look like this and perhaps have some issues. Corinne was never this bad.
But Corinne was a hoarder, until recently. And her book takes you through from her childhood, through her adolescence and into her present day, pinpointing certain incidents and issues that assisted her to justify her hoarding. I found it fascinating, Corinne writes in a very honest way and I think it is a very brave book, especially for someone who is continually in the public eye. Letting go of the physical stuff is only one part of her journey (fuck I hate that word - sorry), letting go of the guilt she grew up with is a whole other ball park.
And that is why I think I connected with this book. Guilt is universal and can creep up on you at certain times in your life, (and personally I think you hit the jackpot when you become a parent). Corinne Grant writes like she speaks, and my friends she certainly speaks the truth
Now, standing at the altar, in front of a foreign god in a foreign country, I closed my eyes, clasped my hands to my forehead, thought of the god of my childhood, and for the first time in my life, I prayed for myself. I asked for help. I didn't feel guilty or selfish, I felt like it was about time.
I opened my eyes and blinked. It felt like I had broken to the surface.
Love it. Although the Lessons in Letting Go is not always so profound and deep.
Corrine grew up in Corryong, a country town 120 kilometers from the uber-chic metropolis that is Albury-Wodonga. And at the age of 15, she wangled some work experience at a Melbourne Radio station, where she was mainly worried the city folk would spot her, point and laugh and call her a "cow rooter." But she had bigger issues to deal with.
My second problem was my wardrobe. (My mother had already refused to buy me a power suit like the ones Melanie Griffith wore in the movies) I fossiked through my wardrobe and dragged out what I thought was my most cosmopolitan outfit. I started with a pair of grey, stretch-flannel culottes: a pair of pants so wide-legged that when you were standing with your legs together they looked like a skirt. Then, for some reasons only my fifteen year old brain could possibly justify, I chose to team them with a hand knitted jumper with a picture of a clown on the front. Looking back in it now, I doubt they even dressed Special Needs kids like that.
To find out how Corinne managed to save a turtle, kill a turtle, turn herself around and sort her shit out as well as and what happened when her father bought her a Le Marchepied, buy this book. Or borrow mine if you live near me and promise to return it. Or put it on your Xmas wish list as you will LOVE it, and that is a promise which I do not give out very often.
Or of course you can win a copy here.
The hot and sexy folk at Allen and Unwin have given me 3 copies of Lessons in Letting Go. Confessions of a Hoarder. Please comment here, telling me .......
What object do you currently posses that should have been chucked a long time ago, and why do you still have it?
My friend Random.Org will select 3 winners on Friday 12th November. So have a good look around your house and let me know. OK?
