[This is the first of a series of loosely connected, perhaps sometimes contradictory, essays sparked by various books and conversations around ideas of neatness, messiness, and the good life]. In my library district many people have waited long months to read Marie Kondo’s book The life-changing magic of tidying up: the Japanese art of decluttering […]
Today, I started reading The Watsons Go to Birmingham- 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis. I haven’t gotten past the first chapter, but it is wonderful so far. The story and characters are engaging, the imagery plays across the page, and the cadence of the language feels like home to me. While it is obvious the […]
Sometime last year or very early this year, I read Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed. It is a heartbreakingly wonderful book. Ms. Strayed combines profound compassion with deep insight. I liked her writing. She knows when to use humor (and when not to) in response to […]
This is not the normal Monday post. Normally, when I do write on Mondays, I try to write about walking/biking/moving. But everything is off kilter. Life is full. Very full. In my work-a-day persona, I am working full-time at the public library. In my do-gooder persona, I’m taking care of a nursing Momma Dog and […]
Today, I didn’t walk, but I did bike. And I did go around parts of the county via bookmobile. I will share just a few impressions from my meandering. First by bike:Â It was 63 degrees this morning. On my bike, it felt quite cool to me, almost cold, and I wondered how much of that […]
I would have written a dose of the Good (and Not So Good) Words yesterday, I had plenty of thoughts I wanted to share with y’all. But the artist who shares a corporal address with me (and a few other folks- Professor WishUp, Scarlet Azalea, Sheila Claws, etc) needed all of our available writing time […]
I feel I must warn my faithful and faithless followers that today’s dose of the Good (and Not So Good) Words may be a bit baroque, an aesthetic that might punish me (and y’all) by not working. If it is baroque, don’t fix it. I can’t fix this, but perhaps we will be transfixed. Today, […]
A few weeks ago, as I was browsing the new book shelves at the library, I came upon Geoff Nicholson’s The Lost Art of Walking: The History, Science , Philosophy, and Literature of Pedestrianism. As a semi-regular regular walker, of course, I checked it out. I started reading it. I enjoyed it for a bit. […]