The Case for Creating: make stuff; it feels good.

My daughter and I enjoyed making this marbled paper.

 On Tuesday, I blogged about the need for "space" in our lives.  We need space from technology and from the general busy-ness that defines modern life.  Boredom or daydreaming are essential in many ways.  A post by researcher and author Scott Barry Kaufman summarizes the benefits of mind-wandering:

 "...self awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implication of self and others' emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion." 

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

These rewards include self- awareness, creative incubation, improvisation and evaluation, memory consolidation, autobiographical planning, goal driven thought, future planning, retrieval of deeply personal memories, reflective consideration of the meaning of events and experiences, simulating the perspective of another person, evaluating the implications of self and others’ emotional reactions, moral reasoning, and reflective compassion - See more at: http://www.creativitypost.com/psychology/mind_wandering_a_personal_perspective#sthash.8I9WpzBi.dpuf

 

Learn about shaving cream marbling here.

That's a lot of benefits!  I'm thoroughly convinced.  I'm also thoroughly convinced of the benefits of creating and making.  Some people have opportunities to use their creativity and "make stuff" in their careers or paid employment.  Although, I suspect that's not the case for a lot of people.  We can certainly do many things in a creative way, even mundane tasks or housework.  But what I'm talking about here is making or doing something as an intentional creative outlet.  My own creative pursuits have been motivated in  the past few years by reading various blog posts and books on creativity, particularly those by authors Brene Brown, Austin Kleon, and Lori Pickert.





A favorite read of mine - from the blog "Rands in Repose" - is entitled "The Builder's High," and is an excellent reminder to create and not just consume.  I'd like to quote the entire post right here.  Please do yourself a favor and read it.  Here are few choice quotes:

 "This is a reminder not to let the digital world full of others' moments deceive you into devaluing your own.  Their moments are infinite - your moments are finite and precious - and...I'm wondering how much we want to create versus consume.

What's the last thing you built when you got on that high?  You know that high I'm talking about?  It's staring at a thing that you brought into the world because you decided it needed to exist."

We also made candles with melted crayons & Crisco.

"Building" or "making" or "creating" 

can take so many different forms: 

 writing, painting, knitting, drawing, soap-making, doodling, sewing, home-decorating, photography, graphic design, collage, wood-working, animation, pottery, choreography, film-making, embroidery, cooking, baking, making sculptures, computer programming, composing music, gardening...

The possibilities are endless, 

and so I'm going to stop trying to list them all.  

 

Learn how to make these candles here.

The key is to find what you enjoy - and that you enjoy both the process and the (potential) product.  Sometimes the product doesn't even matter.  Sure, we feel a sense of accomplish with a satisfactory finished product - a knitted scarf, a short story, a painting, a delicious meal.  However, often the process is just enough.  For me, embroidery is an activity where the process is enough.  I have never completed any particular embroidery project, although maybe someday I will want to do that.  For now, I just enjoy the creative and contemplative process of stitching with colorful thread.






In a well-timed bit of synchronicity, I was re-reading parts of The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron and found this passage in which she writes about how the Bronte sisters and Jane Austen hid their stories under their needlework:

"Needlework, by definition regular and repetitive, both soothes and stimulates the artist within.  Whole plots can be stitched up while we sew.  As artists, we can very literally reap what we sew." 

I love that!  It's all related, isn't it?  Our need for boredom or contemplation - to fuel our need for creative expression and problem-solving - to fuel our need to build and make stuff - during which we might just contemplate our next project or plan.

Are you creating in addition to consuming?  There's nothing wrong with consuming.  We are entertained, enlightened and educated by music and concerts, movies and theater, books and magazines, blogs, social media and YouTube videos.  The key is to be mindful of how our time is spent.  (Seems to be a theme for me this year.)  

So - get started.  Make something!  It'll feel good.   

The Case for Space

I recently stumbled upon Bored and Brilliant, a project of New Tech City.  New Tech City is a podcast about technology and how it changes our lives.  The Bored and Brilliant project is about getting people to rethink their relationship with technology.  It will include a week of challenges, such as delete one app from your smartphone, starting on February 2nd.  According to New Tech City, the average mobile consumer spends 2 hours and 57 minutes a day on his or her phone.  Yikes!  The project encourages people to use the apps Moment or BreakFree to track how many times a day they pick up their phones and how much time they spend on them.  They do acknowledge the irony of using an app to track technology usage.

I like my smartphone, but I'll admit that it can be a distraction.

I downloaded Moment onto my iPhone, just to see what it's all about.  It's too bad that you can't use it without also giving access to your location.  Although I'm sure I'm already using a number of other apps that track my location as well.  Hello, Big Brother.  I can see that Moment or BreakFree could be useful to someone who wants to curb usage of their smartphone.  It's the same concept as a food diary for those who want to lose weight.  When my clothes start getting tight, I use MyFitnessPal as a food diary.  Hey, it works for me.  For example - by tracking my food intake on the app, I realize that a serving of chips means eleven chips and not the whole bag!  I need some help with portion sizes.   

It was interesting to see how Moment works, but my iPhone is not the bulk of my personal technology use.  If I want to be more mindful of time spent on technology, I need to consider time spent on the computer and the iPad also.  I research and write using both of those - but I also waste a good deal of time checking e-mail and Facebook and (yes, I admit) getting sucked into reading articles about over-the-top celebrity plastic surgery botches and epic food fails.  Beyond the computer and mobile devices, technology time for me also includes some television viewing.  I haven't met a British period/costume drama that I haven't wanted to watch yet.  And also, sometimes - American Idol.  I know, my tastes are widely varied. 

Last year, I participated in Screen-Free Week.  I even wrote a blog post about that experience.  The year's event is May 4-10, 2015.  I think I'll participate again.  Maybe you'll join me?  I've also read about people taking a weekly technology sabbath, when they spend a whole day each week without using phones, computers, televisions or other devices.  Other people have put up boundaries around the times of day that they use certain technology or use social media.  Obviously, people feel the need to sometimes limit the presence of technology in their lives.  I know I do.  I am not anti-technology at all.  I appreciate the different ways that my family and I use technology in our lives.  And I do like my smartphone.  Remember Melancholy Mary?  Well, meet Minimalist Mary.  She sure does love a device that can perform multiple functions, because that means she has to own and keep track of fewer things.  Minimalist Mary is happy that her phone also takes photos.  That it can call, text, e-mail, and calculate.  It can take the place of a notebook, calendar, to-do list, alarm clock and much more.  The problem is that the smartphone (and tablet and computer) can also offer a lot of unnecessary options or distractions.  It has even been suggested that the level of technology present in our lives is affecting our attention spans or changing our brains.

In "Smartphones Don't Make Us Dumb" - an opinion piece in The New York Times, Daniel T. Willingham contends that smartphones aren't making us dumb nor are they shrinking our attention spans.  However, smartphones may be making us less willing to pay attention.

Are we more easily bored because "the digital world carries the promise of amusement that is constant, immediate and limitless?"  

Or does our "...appetite for endless entertainment suggests that worthier activities will be shoved aside?" 

It's unclear.  And research hasn't proven either of those theories yet.  But if we are losing our ability to daydream, that would not be good.  Because research has definitely shown that daydreaming has many benefits, including "an association with greater creativity."

This makes sense to me.  Creative ideas or solutions often come to me in the quiet spaces of my life - a solitary walk in the park, in the shower, while falling asleep, standing in the kitchen mashing bananas for bread.  Sometimes I even have my aha! moments in the middle of the night.  Two times when I was writing very important family tributes - the speech for my parents' 50th wedding anniversary and the eulogy for my dad's funeral - the important ideas came together as I was thinking and falling asleep.  I had to get up and scratch out a few notes or sit down at the computer and type.

We need quiet space in our lives, time to daydream, time to be bored (as the Bored and Brilliant project frames it).  Sometimes we just sit and daydream.  Sometimes we perform a potentially contemplative task - hiking in the woods, listening to music, doodling, knitting, baking, etc. - where our minds have the freedom to ponder.  Our minds don't have the freedom to ponder if we're filling our empty spaces or waiting times with scrolling through Facebook or Twitter or playing games on our smartphone.  That becomes multitasking, which does not give us space to daydream or to observe what's happening around us.  Some research indicates that multitasking may not be a good thing at all.  According to this article on Forbes.com, researchers "found that people who are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information cannot pay attention, recall information, or switch from one job to another as well as those who complete one task at a time."   

There's definitely a case for "space" in our lives.  Are you mindful of the technology in your life?  Would you like to change your relationship with it?

*****

Coming up later this week...a somewhat related post about creativity.  

I tagxedo. Do you tagxedo? Word clouds & blog themes

This word cloud was generated from my blog's home page using Wordle.

On June 18th, 2014, I posted on this blog for the first time.  I wrote:  "This blog is my project and the next step on my path as a writer."  Then I started a 30-day blog challenge beginning on June 23rd, with the stated purpose of creating accountability for my writing.  I successfully completed the challenge with my thirtieth post on July 22nd.  In that post, I wrote about how it felt to put myself out there, be vulnerable and share my work.  The content of my 30-day blog challenge varied greatly, as I said it would - everything from a silly haiku or limerick to book reviews or longish philosophical musings.  In one post, I admitted that my blog didn't have a central theme and called it a blog about nothing (and anything), but also wrote:

"When I think about what I do like to write about, there are some general themes:  family life; education and lifelong learning; nature; writing, journaling and other types of creative expression; books and reading; my neighborhood and city.  I like to tell stories and to inject some humor when I can."

This word cloud was generated from my post "a blog about nothing (and anything)."

My writing did relate to some of those themes during my 30-day blog challenge.  I also told stories about myself and my family.  My most popular post to date is "This Baby," which is about my oldest child's open heart surgery when he was two weeks old.  Although I've journaled about that over the years, sitting down and writing about it for my blog helped me to put the experience in a form - sixteen years later - that really touched me and others.

This word cloud was generated from my "This Baby" post.

 
I guess my point is - my blog doesn't exactly have a theme, and that's okay.  Maybe the point of my blog is to help me grow as a writer.  I'm not looking to focus on one topic; I'm too curious and attention-challenged for that anyway!  In addition to the topics already mentioned, I also like to read and write about personal growth topics.  Who knows what else!?

My sincere and heartfelt thanks to those who have read this or any of my posts so far!     
(And continue reading below to learn more about word clouds.)

*****

About word clouds:

Creating word clouds can be addicting - I'm warning you.  (I had to stop myself from creating more and more word clouds for this post.)  My daughter and I have used word clouds to create gifts, including inserts for handmade books, posters, and t-shirts (by printing word clouds on iron-on transfer paper).  Word clouds are a great tool and/or form of expression for kids, adults, teachers, students, homeschoolers, writers, artists, business-owners and anyone looking for some creative fun.  Word clouds can be generated from a website or you can manually enter a list of words about a certain theme or topic.

Wordle is fun, but more limited.  A big drawback is that you can only either print your word cloud or save it to their public gallery.  You can't save it to your computer.  The only way to save it and edit it is to take a screen shot of it, which works okay.

Tagxedo is better in our opinion.  First, it has a lot more options for formatting.  You can even put your words into shapes, not just "clouds."  And with Tagxedo, there are more options for saving, editing and manipulating your word clouds.     

Enjoy!

This one is from the post "Life is Sweet."

Melancholy Mary listens to sad songs, and her children *still* don't go to bed.

A whole new year

Started as a new year's post, was abandoned for a time, 

ambled through philosophical thoughts, and ended with sad songs.  

The start of a new year always excites me with the promise of new possibilities.  At the same time, I was feeling a bit melancholy lately.  Partly because I don't love winter and clearly remember last winter's long, cold and dark days.  Partly because I was thinking about the various struggles going on locally and globally.  "Melancholy" can mean "a gloomy state of mind," but also can mean "sober thoughtfulness; pensiveness."  I do have a pensive (slightly brooding) side to myself.  Just call me Melancholy Mary.  I actually discovered Melancholy Mary when I was in seventh or eighth grade at Blessed Sacrament Grade School.  In our religion workbook, there was a section about the four temperaments.  I can't believe I remember this.  The temperaments were represented by four characters:  Choleric Cal, Melancholy Mary, Sanguine Sue, and Phlegmatic Phil.   I don't remember anything else about those workbook pages or much about grade school at all, but I remember those names.  Especially Melancholy Mary.

Is it very melancholy to think of life as a struggle?  Merriam-Webster.com defines "struggle" (the verb) as "to try very hard to do, achieve, or deal with something that is difficult or that causes problems."  Right now I know people who are struggling with their own or their loved one's serious illnesses or challenges, both mental and physical.  Others are suffering from income loss or other financial hardships.  Relationships with spouses, children, parents or friends change or falter.  Grief is ongoing for those who have experienced the death of a loved one.  Change, and the struggle to adjust to change, is ever present.  Often life does not turn out quite the way we expected.  Beyond our personal struggles, there are the bigger struggles of our world.  Violence, poverty, tragedies.  I don't think it's pessimistic to think of life as a struggle.  I truly believe that Life is Sweet, as I've written.  Yet, despite what our conditioning or culture may tell us, when we recognize our struggles, that's when we can really connect.  Why do people think it's better to not talk about our struggles?  It makes them feel uncomfortable, so they want challenges and emotions to be hidden.  Or they want to offer solutions or advice rather than simply listen.  Or they think talking about things will make the situation worse.  When, really, just talking and being acknowledged can sometimes be exactly what we need.

When I was a youngish mother of three children ages five and under, I was talking to another mom who also had three children, just a bit older than mine.  I truly loved mostly everything about pregnancy, nursing, babies and small children, but it wasn't always easy.  I don't remember exactly what the other mom and I were talking about - maybe the sleeplessness, the physicality, or the constant needs.  And she said, "It's hard."  That's it - two simple words.  She acknowledged the struggle.  It didn't make me feel worse.  It made me feel better and, not incidentally, more ready for the challenges.  The fact that I remember this incident so many years later is a testament to the power of being able to share our struggles and have them acknowledged.

Which brings me back to the title of this post.  "Sad songs, they say so much."  Thanks, Elton John.  I really love sad songs, and I'm not the only one.  A Google search yielded an abundance of results about sad songs.  Maybe we like sad songs because we feel like we're able to share someone's struggle or feel some solidarity with the singer or the song.  It's a bit of a stretch, I know, but writing this post led me to sad songs.  As I started thinking about sad songs and researching them online, I fell down a very deep rabbit hole.  I read lists of sad songs, made my own list and watched a YouTube video of "Cat's in the Cradle."  (I love that terribly sad song.)  Then, I tried to find a certain sad song, remembering only the melody and the lyrics "goodbye, Michelle."  I couldn't remember the chorus, but I was convinced that Don McLean sang it.  After extensively researching Don McLean and still not finding my mystery song,  I decided to listen to American Pie, which is clearly the longest song in the history of the world.  Eventually, a random Google search found what I was looking for - "Seasons in the Sun," which was actually by Terry Jacks.  Of course, then I had to search for the lyrics, listen to the song and also listen to more folk/rock music of the 1970s, most of which is also melancholy.

Through this entire process, all three of my children were swirling about me.  Absorbed as I was in my research, I didn't realize it was almost 10:30pm.  It was a weeknight.  The eleven year old should have been in bed, and the teenagers should have either been in bed or studying.  Yet there they were.  And there I was:  half-tuned into the music and the Wikipedia entries and half-tuned into the crazy threesome wrestling, dancing, fake-soccer playing, rough-housing, jumping on the couch. 

And I heard:
"How do you dance to this music?"
"This is a Kermit the Frog song."
"I'm not wrestling, I'm pretending to get injured in soccer."
"Is this 80s music?"
"I know this song - Uncle Chris plays this song."

And I said:
"Maybe you sway, like this.  Or clap."
"No."
"Stop wrestling!"
"This is waaaaay before the 80s."
"You should get ready for bed."
"Boys, are you done with your homework?" 

And I thought:
Seventies music has not caused them to flee to their rooms.
I'm happy that my three teen/tween children still gravitate toward me,
that we are here together in this room laughing and singing and dancing and wrestling,
even if it is too late on a school night.
I love these people, and I love this life.
This beautiful-messy, happy-sad, joy-struggle of a thing called life... 

And, so if anyone at all is reading this:
My wish for you, for this still nearly-new 2015,
is for a beautiful-messy, happy-sad, joy-struggle year of this thing called life!

*****

Melancholy Mary & daughter enjoy a sunny winter day inside the tropical dome @ Mitchell Park Conservatory.

Post-script:

I also like happy songs.
Love them, actually.
As the Muppets sing,
"Life's a happy song when there's someone by my side to sing along."

We need the happy songs and the sad songs, don't we?

Some of the sad songs on my list:
Cat's in the Cradle - Harry Chapin
Seasons in the Sun - Terry Jacks
Rocket Man - Elton John
I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues - Elton John
Blowin' in the Wind - Peter, Paul & Mary
Leaving on a Jet Plane - John Denver
Everybody Hurts - R.E.M.
Redemption Song - Bob Marley
Here I Go Again On My Own - White Snake
Drive - The Cars

Do you like sad songs?  What are your favorites?

October through December reading notes: catching up

I haven't written monthly reading notes since September.  This post covers the books I read from October through the end of the year.  I hope to keep up with reading notes each month in 2015.

Novels:

Night's Child by Maureen Jennings
Vices of My blood by Maureen Jennings
These two books are from the Murdoch Mystery series, which I've written about before.

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien
Not technically a novel, this is the classic collection of semi-autobiographical stories related to O'Brien's experiences as a young American soldier in Vietnam.  I've never felt inclined to read this book, but my 16 year old son read part of it for a class and recommended it.  You should read this book.  A heartbreaking and important glimpse into a time and place in history.

May Contain Nuts: A Novel of Extreme Parenting
by John O'Farrell
I mistakenly thought that  I was writing a satirical novel about modern-day parenting, and so I wanted to read one.  Having already read Tom Perrotta's Little Children several years ago, I searched online for something else and came across this book by a British novelist.  This over-the-top caricature of competitive parenting is pretty funny but tiresome at times.  

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
I'm a huge fan of Victorian-era novels, but I had never read anything by Wilkie Collins.  My friend Celeste suggested I start with this one.  Good advice.  I stayed up way too late a few nights in a row as I read this 600+ pages book compulsively.  Loved it! 
(Side-note:  This is the first full-length book that I've read on a tablet.  Reading a very long book in bed late at night, it was great to have it on the lightweight and bright iPad.)    

*****

 Nonfiction:

Mastering Showing and Telling in Your Fiction
by Marcy Kennedy
This is a short and good read with lots of helpful examples of how to improve storytelling in fiction.  Now I just need to go back to some of my drafts and put the ideas into practice.

Zen Pencils: Cartoon Quotes from Inspirational Folks by Gavin Aung Than
I been following Gavin Aung Than's website Zen Pencils for a while now.  Than adapts inspirational quotes into cartoon stories.  When I heard that a compilation of his cartoons was coming out in book form, I immediately put it on hold at the library.  My sixteen year old son read the book first, as a break from studying for finals.  My other two children and I read it, too.  We all agree - thumbs up!
   
Rebuilt:  Awakening the Faithful, Reaching the Lost, and Making Church Matter
by Michael J. White and Tom Corcoran
I read this for a discussion with my church's Parish Council.  We haven't had the discussion yet, but I'm looking forward to it.  Although not entirely applicable to our parish, because it describes the experiences of a suburban church rather than our very urban church, it was an easy read and thought-provoking in ways.

Two additional nonfiction titles that I started but did not finish:
How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why It Happens by Benedict Carey
A Mind for Numbers: How to Excel at Math and Science by Barbara Oakley
I heard about both of these titles on NPR.  Many of the books' ideas really overlapped, such as:
- self-testing on material you want to learn is more effective than highlighting or re-reading
- smaller amounts of spaced studying is more effective than a larger amount of time all at once
- studying the same material in different rooms or environments helps the material stick better
- discussions of how long and short term memory work
I love books about learning and how the brains works, but - unfortunately- I couldn't completely get into either of these.  The writers' styles just didn't click with me, or perhaps I didn't have the concentration for nonfiction at the time I was reading them.

*****

Children 's novels that I read with or to my daughter:

The Cricket in Times Square by George Selden
Tucker's Countryside by George Selden
I have previously read the classic, award-winning children's book The Cricket in Times Square.  I was inspired to read it again, to my youngest child, after we observed some crickets on a nature walk.  We also read Tucker's Countryside by the same author.  These are heartwarming animal stories with charming characters.  Plus, you may learn a bit about music and life in NYC circa 1960 (when the book was published) from The Cricket in Times Square.  And the conservation message in Tucker's Countryside is even more timely today than when the book was published in 1969.

Chasing Vermeer by Blue Balliett
This is a fun and intriguing mystery with some art history (and even math) mixed in.  It got my daughter and me a bit interested in Vermeer and very interested in pentominos.  I'd like to read this book's two sequels, The Wright 3 and The Calder Game.  Balliett has a pretty cool website, too.

Time Cat by Lloyd Alexander
This book, published in 1963, is about a time-traveling cat.  We thought it was okay, but not great.  Who knew a cat preceded The Time Warp Trio and The Magic Tree House in time-traveling adventures?  Alexander is better known for his classic children's fantasy series, The Chronicles of Prydain, which two of my children read and really enjoyed.

Mara, Daughter of the Nile by Eloise Jarvis McGraw
We loved this book.  I hadn't heard of Eloise Jarvis McGraw until I was homeschooling my children.  When studying Ancient Egypt, we read The Golden Goblet, also by this author and also fantastic.  Both are historical fiction with some mystery mixed in.  As with other "older" children's novels, you'll find the language more sophisticated than children's novels of today, but I think that's a good thing. 

*****

Short stories:
I've read a number of short stories over the past few months.  They are all pretty dark stories (except for "David's Haircut").  Some are stories that are referenced in The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry, a novel I wrote about in the summer.  Others are stories that my sons read for English class.  I'm listing them by author, alphabetically.  I recommend them all and provide links to where you can read them online if you're interested. 
 
"The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell  (way before The Hunger Games)
"Lamb to the Slaughter" by Roald Dahl (He didn't just write children's novels.)
"David's Haircut" by Ken Elkes  (Beautiful!  I want to be able to write a story like this.)
"August Heat" by William Fryer Harvey
"The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson  (How did I never read this classic story before?)
"The Possibility of Evil" by Shirley Jackson  
"The Cask of Amontillado" by Edgar Allan Poe
"The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe


*****

Whew!  That was a lot of reading to recap.  This month I'm working on a couple of nonfiction titles, and I'm hoping to read another novel by Wilkie Collins.

What are you reading?

In which I stop eating Christmas cookies for breakfast & start writing again

It's hard to start doing something again that you haven't done for a while.  For example, it's hard to start eating healthy breakfasts again when you convinced yourself that it was okay to eat Christmas cookies for breakfast over the holidays.  Those were some sweet breakfasts!  Thank goodness the cookies were gone before I completely outgrew my wardrobe.  It was a close call.

These are not breakfast food.

Neither are these.

Also, it may be hard to start writing again after getting out of the habit.  You will come up with a million ways to avoid it, if you're me.  In fact, before writing this post I spent five minutes googling "back in the saddle," "back in the game," "it's hard to start doing things again," and other variations on these idioms or ideas.  Excessive research is a common avoidance technique of mine.  Of course, the only way to start doing something again is to do it.  So, I'm back on oatmeal for breakfast.  I started journaling again last week, and I'm posting to my blog today.  

I haven't blogged since October 17, 2014.  That's over eleven weeks ago.  My last post was about National Novel Writing Month.  I participated in NaNoWriMo 2014, but I did not "win" by reaching the official 50,000 word count.  Still, I managed to write 22,000 words between November first and twentieth.  Then I quit.  I forced myself to keep at it for a while in the hopes that inspiration would come, but the truth is that I don't have a novel in me right now.  I don't regret quitting NaNoWriMo.  What I do regret is that I gave up writing altogether for the rest of the calendar year.  I didn't write in my journals, nor did I write a single blog post.  And the longer I didn't do it, the harder it became to start up again. 

I completely dropped the habit of writing, a habit that is very good for me by the way.  Writing, along with exercising, flossing my teeth, and reading (as a few examples) are good habits that keep me healthy or happy or both.  I'm fortunate to have an exercise partner, which keeps me on track with that habit.  Flossing my teeth is something I started forcing myself to do on a nightly basis several years ago.  (If you know me, you know that I'm a little bit afraid of going to the dentist and that's part of my motivation.)  Now flossing is part of my nighttime routine, and I very rarely skip it.  I love reading, so I'm not inclined to avoid it.  What about writing?  I can see why I let blogging slide, because it sometimes feels "hard" to me.  But I'm not sure why I let my journal writing slide.  Maybe I didn't have an established system to keep my writing habit on track.   For example, many writers write at the same time everyday no matter what.

Recently, I read an interesting blog post by James Clear about the difference between goals and systems, and it really made me think.  Goals can stay in my head, but systems (or habits) are actions.  I find this idea helpful in terms of aligning my actions to what I say is truly important to me, rather than just randomly moving from task to task while maintaining vague goals.  When my children were smaller, I aimed for us to have a rhythm to our days.  It was flexible, but it helped us all navigate our days.  And then...seasons change, rhythms change, schedules change, children grow older.  Sometimes we adjust well to changes, other times not so much.  Sometimes new routines are easily established, other times we flounder.  With two children in high school this year and one still being homeschooled, I felt sort of scattered and pulled in different directions these past few months.

Perhaps this was more of a transition for me than I thought it would be.  Maybe I took too much of a wait and see attitude about things.  Oddly, I have also been feeling like I'm "on call" all the time.  For example, sometimes I feel like I'm always doing housework.  That's not true at all.  But perhaps if I'm tossing in a load of laundry here and there, instead of having a system of sorts - then it does feel like I'm doing it all the time.  I'm not talking about rigid systems here, but rather guidelines.  I think we all - no matter our work/family/home situations - benefit from re-evaluating our daily habits and routines from time-to-time, particularly when we are in transition in some way.  Otherwise, we may not be intentional about how we use our time.  Often it's easier to choose the (seemingly) urgent (housework, checking e-mail, paperwork, etc.) over the important (whatever meaningful tasks help us reach our goals).  I originally read about this idea many years ago in Stephen Covey's book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.  Many have reiterated Covey's basic ideas.  I found a nice distillation of this concept in an article written by Martha Beck for O, The Oprah Magazine. It's an idea worth revisiting.

So, at the start of 2015, I am committed to establishing systems that will help me use my time to do the things that are most important to me and my family.  Have you thought about your own goals for 2015?  How might you establish systems or habits that help you work toward those goals?