#perkss

I finally finished the book. After a couple days of reading it, at some points liking everything about it and others just thinking why does Charlie always cry--I finished it. I ended up really liking it. You can really relate to the book in many ways. The ending with Charlie and his aunt was a little unexpected, but an interesting plot twist. 

I've said this before and I will say it again, I underlined all the quotes and one liners I thought were really good and that was perhaps my favorite thing about the book. There were so many well delivered one liners. So many were so relevant to what is going on in my life too. I really ended up liking the book, it was really a good read. 

When they got to the last few letters and he began talking about graduation and how he was scared to be alone at school...that hit pretty close to home. "It's strange because sometimes, I read a book, and I think I am the people in the book." I couldn't help but think back to when those exact thoughts were still going through my head. How I didn't want to graduate at all and wanted to stay with my friends in high school forever. I loved high school and loved (and still love!) my friends so much. It totally was relatable when he began talking about that. Perhaps my favorite part towards the end was when he started speaking about him hanging out with his friends the last few nights of the last week they were going to be together. That is exactly what I did...and you imagine doing crazy things and go all out for the last time before everything changes yet we just sat around. Which is exactly what they did in the book. I quote:

"We just sat around on the rug in the "games" room, remembering things...The inside jokes weren't jokes anymore. They had become memories.....And nobody felt sad as long as we could postpone tomorrow with more nostalgia."

It was beautifully stated. And that is EXACTLY what my friends and I did. It's sad to go off knowing everything is going to change, and even if youare still friends years from now, nothing is ever going to be exactly the same. "And in that moment, I swear we were infinite." 

It was reading this though that made me think of all the great times I had with my friends. We had awesome times. Most of them similar to in the book were just sitting around, joking and talking. Nothing ever needed to be fancy. My favorite thing (or one of them) similar to Charlie in the book was the car rides. We always had a great time in the car. Whether it was being scared, crying from bugs in the car, singing, or just talking it was always great. The best rides though, again soo similar to the book, were the ones that we had all the windows down for, the music was blaring and we were singing at the top of our lungs, and we were driving really fast with our hands out the window, taking turns standing up  to hang outside the moonroof. Those were perfect times. Where we really did all feel "infinite". "Sam tapped her hand on the steering wheel. Patrick held his hand outside the car and made air waves. And I just sat between them...And Sam and Patrick looked at me like I said the greatest thing they ever heard. Because the song was great and because we all really paid attention to it. Five minutes of a lifetime were truly spent, and we felt young in a good way."  

Now I look back and those are times I will never forget. I wish we could relive them once again. "I could hear all these songs on the radio, but the radio wasn't on."  I am looking forward to many, many, many more times just like that :) So we can have stories to tell one day. Just giant lists of stories. We better continue taking lots and lots of pictures too to go with these awesome tales :)"I was looking at the old photographs, I started thinking that there was a time when these weren't memories. That someone actually took that photograph, and the people in the photograph had just eaten lunch or something."