#teachingisfun

I hate reading. It is always hard for me. So lately, I’ve been reading only work-related things.

But this time, I chose something totally different – “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing” by Matthew Perry.

Maybe fans of Friends know Chandler well. In this book, you have a chance to know Matthew.

I was waiting impatiently for this book to be out. Once it was available, I immediately bought it. I was so impatient to read it that I purchased it as an e-book for 13,29$ on Amazon instead of waiting for the paper book to be delivered to Ukraine.

I have a strong habit of highlighting and color coding in books: pink – great idea; green – well said; blue – a new word.

In this book, almost all sentences are in pink.

This is not an easy book, yet it is easy to read. Matthew is writing about his hard times in not a snotty way.

It is a beautiful memoir about different periods of Matthew’s life.

It is an honest book. I bet it was not easy to write it.

Matthew is telling stories about his life when he nearly died, how his struggles with addiction, his fear of being alone, his best ex-girlfriend Rachel Dunn, how he is afraid of his own thoughts, how doctors prescribed him barbiturates when he was about 2 weeks old just because he would not stop crying, how he would give up all his money, cars and houses just to stop his pain, and many more stories.

Time flies when you read this book. I haven’t read excellent books for a long time!

Here are a few of my favorite quotes in pink:

🖤”I need love, but I don’t trust it. If I drop my game, my Chandler, and show you who I really am, you might notice me, but worse, you might notice me and leave me. And I can’t have that. I won’t survive that. Not anymore.”

🖤”And now these scars on my stomach. These broken love affairs. Leaving Rachel. (No not that one. The real Rachel. The ex-girlfriend of my dreams, Rachel.) They haunt me as I lie awake at 4:00 A.M., in my house with a view in the Pacific Palisades. I’m fifty-two. It’s not that cute anymore.”

🖤”I would give up everything—every car, every house, all the money—just to make it stop.”

I didn’t like Chandler, but I fell in love with Matthew 💔

Picture – Yana Fedirko