What
makes us choose to read the memoir of someone we’ve never heard of?
We
hope for heart-stopping adventure:
“I
glanced ahead at the two pilots, and saw that there was a red light blinking on
the dashboard. I looked over at Matthieu with wide eyes, and saw that he was
already looking at me. “Something’s wrong,” he mouthed. My
heart sank and I grew cold with dread.”
We
hope for romance:
“After
a short time of his guiding me with strong hands, and spinning me without
hesitation, I felt like I was starting to follow where he led more smoothly. It
didn’t seem as if he would ever tire; and every so often, he glanced at me and
smiled encouragingly, as I focused on not making a mistake. I forgot we were
supposed to be friends when he held me like that. When his hands pushed me one
way, grabbed me around the waist and then spun me another way, my stomach
quivered in a way that didn’t feel like we were friends.”
We
hope for magic:
“But
far, far up, with just the darkness above and below me, I stared down at the
boats that were lost and isolated in the vast obscurity of the ocean, and whose
lights were visible only to me. It struck me, as I contemplated this
star-studded sky upside down, that this must be the way God sees his people who
love goodness and mercy. We are the bright, shining lights he sees in a dark
world, ravaged by evil and decay.”
And
we hope to see the triumph of the human spirit over adversity:
“I’ll
never forget that day on the mountain, the day when the sights and feelings
were so foreign it was like someone else’s life momentarily juxtaposed mine—the
day I tried to outrun my pain.
I
remember how we turned towards the mountain, coasting freely over the
crisscross of yellowed roads with their large grids of golden rice waving in
the glaring sun almost as far as the eye could see. And the image of that hot
sun, blue sky, the golden rice, the green and brown set of mountains ahead, and
me, flying, flying across it all… I think this scene will flood my vision with
its brilliant colors in my last days.”
I hope you will find all that and more in mine!