A few months ago, I started a blog post about my struggles with my youngest going to college and leaving me with the proverbial empty nest. I never got around to publishing that blog. Now it has taken me several attempts to hit the publish button on this one. Despite my usual tendency to overshare, something in me doesn’t want to put this out into the world. But here goes…. Honestly, I felt like I handled the empty nest better than anticipated. I was sad, don’t get me wrong, but I had spent months preparing for the sadness. The struggle Read More
Tag: Life
Audiobooks I Solemnly Swear to Listen to Once Each Year
My first blog post was about some of the books that have changed my life. I have also made it known that I rely on audiobooks to help me reach my reading goals. (BTW, as soon as I finish my current audiobook, I will have met my goal for the year.) I know there are endless podcasts and playlists and other things that I could be listening to… but I often find myself returning to some of my favorite audiobooks time and time again. Naturally, I love fiction audiobooks. Some of my family’s road trip picks have been Mary Shelley’s Read More
Excellence is Not an Act, It’s a Habit
This adage from Aristotle gets kicked around a lot. We all want to be Excellent, right? Then again, some of us want to spend a lot of our time watching Star Trek reruns. I have to believe that there is space in my life for both. At my previous job, I had this quote posted at my desk. I had that job for a long time, so I am not sure when my fascination with habits started, but I began following James Clear and Gretchen Rubin several years ago. I just finished the audiobook of James’s new book Atomic Habits. Read More
Wool and My Own Story in Context
I liked this book. My book club was a bit up in the air on it. Some felt it dragged, but most enjoyed the story. It took me 2 months to read it, but I don’t feel like it was dragging… I had to put it down sometimes and go read something less depressing (like a retelling of Alice in Wonderland with sexual violence and cannibalism.) Don’t let that turn you away. This was my problem, not the book’s. It was a rough patch for me, and this book just took me deeper into that… in a literal sense. Given Read More
The Life-Changing Magic Of Literature
or 7 Books That Literally Changed My Life It is undebatable that literature is life-changing, so I will not try to convince you. Oprah would file this under: “What I know for sure.” When I think about my life and the book-related events that have influenced me the most, these are the books that I consistently mention and why: Heidi by Johanna Spyri I don’t think I ever read this book. I won’t swear to it, but I don’t remember reading it. Why would I list a book as being very influential in my life if I don’t remember having Read More