Don’t borrow this book from the library because if you’re anything like me you’ll find yourself compulsively underlining bits of it that speak to you. Look at Me covers a hectic day in the life of German music teacher Katharina, caught in a web of complex relationships with her often absent husband, two live children, sister, friends and neighbours. Memories of her past, the painful and joyous aspects of it, come to her as the day progresses, and musings on what the future will be like without her in it, as she is harbouring a secret ‘something’ which she is believes to be a malignant breast cancer. Her musings on parenthood are profound:
“I sometimes think I could be free if it weren’t for the children. As long as they’re around, I’m bound and chained to them, plagued by worries, consumed by doubts and unable to make the slightest decision for myself without considering their feelings. But I know it’s not true. If they weren’t around, it would mean they were dead – that I’d lost them. And no one is less free than parents who have lost children.”
And some of her musings are less profound, but also true:
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my adult life, it’s that it never hurts to go to the toilet if you get the chance.”
The sheer pace of Katharina’s life will make you grateful for your own. She deals with more chaos in one day than most of us do in a month, yet she seems incapable of recognising her own quiet heroism. As she points out, “[i]f you remove one component from a functioning system, chaos will surface. No order is anything other than superficial – peep underneath and you’ll see the grime and the crumbs. Looked at like that, there’s nothing menacing about chaos- it’s the most ordinary thing in the world.”
It’s a unforgettable pleasure to spend a day with her.
