WHAT I'M READING

I am currently reading two books at the same time. Well… really three because yesterday Amazon was having a sale on Dick Gregory’s Natural Diet for Folk Who Eat and I bought it with the intent of having it on reserve, but I’ve already read through the first chapter. I am somewhere into chapter four of Daring Greatly by Brene Brown, a book I should have read a while ago, but am only just now getting to for a book club. This book club that may never actually become a book club because none of us seem to be able to find a clear moment in our current schedules. You should read my latest texts to Robin about planning an OKC visit. My inability to nail down some dates for that trip was embarrassing. The third book, which I’m only five pages into, is Michael Pollan’s This Is Your Mind on Plants. I actually picked this one up for research purposes and should be setting the other two books aside for this week because I have plans.

I’m just going to leave that last sentence openly vague.

It kind of feels like I’m back in college because I am usually not a person that reads more than one book at a time. I must finish the book, no matter how terrible of a read, before I can pick up a new book. This has always been my reading method with the exception of college. Then I would be reading multiple books at a time, but not fun books. In fact I didn’t read any fun books between 1997 and 2000. As soon as I turned in my final revision of my master’s thesis, I started devouring books. I was going through books so quickly that Chris had to put me on a book budget. He was all “look, I love books too and I love that you love books, but we need to pay the light bill.” After Chris died, I couldn’t even get through a magazine let alone a whole book for at least a couple of years. It was like I had to teach myself to read again. I am nowhere near the devouring book level that I was before Chris’s death, but I am reading and finishing books again. Though still mostly reading and finishing one at a time. Three books at a time is not my normal.

I think what’s happening here is that I am putting myself back in school in a sense. I am majoring in the Inner Workings of Cindy. I did not necessarily pick these three books up for pleasure, not that I don’t enjoy reading them. It’s just that they are kind of serious, need to be studied kind of books. I am already regretting that I bought the digital copy of Daring Greatly because I want to put sticky note tabs in places and write in the margins. Because of course, if I am ‘going back to school’, I want to be the valedictorian. I probably need to add The Gifts of Imperfection to my reading list while I’m at it. The truth is that I have put myself back into the classroom because I am craving (and probably in need of) some internal changes. It’s all part of that making space for myself thing I’ve got going. Cleaning out my closet and my brain.

Maybe I’ll write a post some day about openly vague sentences.

I TURNED 41

Snuggles

See this Instagram photo by @elephant_soap * 4 likes

Michael said something a day or two ago about how I didn't write anything about my birthday. I shrugged and said "Huh, I guess I didn't." and then I kind of shuffled away. My birthday was a non-event this year. We went out to a fancy dinner the Sunday before where we ate snails and I drank two Pimm's cups. The day of my birthday, I took Josephine to the groomer and I met with my massage therapist where I laid on a biomat filled with healing crystals and voodoo. Michael took his truck in to get a hitch installed and I picked him up so he wouldn't have to wait around all day. We went to lunch, cheap vietnamese food and then I spent the rest of the afternoon on the couch watching Hell on Wheels.

This is fine. I am not upset about any of it. Sure, I have had better birthdays. Remember that time just before I interviewed for this job when I requested a strawberry cake and Audra said strawberries were not in season? I thought I was getting something else and when I cut into it, it was all pink. It was a surprise strawberry cake! That was a good birthday. I have also had worse birthdays, as many of you well know. So when Michael said something about me not writing an entry for that day, what I should have told him was that there was nothing really to write about. Actually, that is how I feel in general right now. In fact I have deleted three different entries, one was a list of things I didn't do last week, one was woe is me tale of birthdays, and one was regarding the camper. We freaked out about the camper we were buying and have since downgraded back to the original pop-up. We get it on Saturday. 

Here are some things that have taken up so much space in my brain over the last two weeks:

• The camp trailer. The size of said camp trailer. Hauling that camp trailer. Parking that camp trailer in the driveway. This problem has been solved.
• Politics. Confirmation hearings. Cabinet members who have been chosen to head cabinets they are totally against. Losing the Affordable Care Act. The gag order issued to scientists to not discuss their work or publish data. A wall that Mexico is not going to pay for, but funding will probably come from dismantling the National Endowment for the Arts. The loss of our National Parks. The list really looks like this woman's sign.

• Building a yoga workshop on straps and maybe blocks. I lugged my giant yoga binder from teacher training out of the basement and started a list of poses. I have an idea for a handout that I need to build and then get that list of poses organized into a lesson. I will do this before February.
• Updating my life list or taking it down. I haven't looked at that thing in years. It is outdated and i haven't been keeping track of things like how many museums I've been too. There's also items on the list that are just plain sad now. I should do something about that.
• Starting a science lesson entry blog post. I thought I'd write up something about the Scientific Method and how to apply that method. Maybe give people a better understanding of what goes into the process of preparing data and information for publication. 
• The idea that I'm sitting in a hamster wheel, just spinning and go nowhere. That idea is totally unfair because I have been busy doing science and making progress in that science. I have been active with rallies and contacting my Senator every day. Thursday evening is the AIDS Walk Kick Off party and Terry has asked me to be a photographer since the original guy bailed out. I am worried that I am not an aggressive enough photographer for this job, but it is all part of being a volunteer. I am busy.

I think that's it.