Nine hours, 24 minutes, 51 seconds and counting...

I started the challenge yesterday at 1:30 p.m.  It's been going fairly well. I spent the afternoon reading Take Good Care of the Garden and the Dogs (more about that in a minute). In the evening did some reading of other participants' blogs, decided not to read Daughters of Gaia, and got a tiny start on I Am the Messenger.  I then stayed up past midnight listening to the audio book of The Woman in White.  I woke up about 5:30 to go to the bathroom.  I seriously considered getting up then, but decided a bit more sleep would probably be a good idea.  I woke up for the second time at 6:30 and started this post.

I wasn't sure what I would think about Take Good Care of the Garden and the Dogs: Family, Friendships, and Faith in Small-Town Alaska (by Heather Lende).  I believe I checked it out after it was recommended in a newsletter from our local bookstore.  I definitely enjoyed it and I'm glad I chose it to start the challenge.  It was good enough stuff that I want to share a few excerpts and ideas verbatim.

It is often said that there are no atheists in foxholes.  It seems to me that shelled bunkers would be full of skeptics.  In the middle of a war it must be harder, not easier, to believe in a good God. If it were up to me, I'd change that line to there are no atheists in delivery rooms or adoption agencies, but maybe that's because I have given birth to four children and have adopted one.   (p.5)

 Lende was run over by a truck while biking in April 2005.  I didn't know this about her when I picked up this book.  A year ago, I was hit by a car while crossing the street and, while my injuries were nothing compared to Lende's, there was much with which I could identify.  As I am approaching the one-year mark (June 23) it was a good time for me to be reading this book.

I . . . realized that most of us have been hit by a proverbial truck at least once and that, as broadsides go, mine may have been one of the easier to recover from because it was so literal and so public, compared to breast cancer or a messy divorce. (p.8)

 Speaking of grocery lists her mother left before her death:

Maybe it is wishful thinking, or maybe I didn't have enough for lunch and am light-headed, but what I hear her notes, and thus her, is this:  eat dessert, be sure there's coffee for the morning, write things down so you don't forget them, and don't waste paper . . . a person could do worse than to live by those words . . . (p 101-102)

 The back cover describes Lende's writing as "part Annie Dillard, part Anne Lamott".  The comparison resonates with me, at least the Anne Lamott part -- Reading what Lende has to say about faith makes me want to do an about-face and embrace Christianity once more.  She makes me proud of my (fellow?) Christians.

Maybe what humans lack in understanding we make up for with faith.  I do know deep down that there is something good about this world -- and that something is love.  You don't have to be a Christian to know that's why we keep picking each other up every time we fall down.  You just have to be human.  I hope that someday I'll really love my neighbors, especially the difficult ones . . . In the meantime, I'll keep going to my church, because I know what our vicar, Jan would say about this.  It's the same message she preached on "Love Your Neighbor Sunday," and the same one she reiterates in one form or another every Sunday.  We are called by Jesus to be good to all people, even those we don't think we like, much less love . . . This, and only this, will ever shake up the world enough to change it." (p. 160-161)

 As I've been recovering from my accident, I've been very conscious of not referring to my injured arm, shoulder, and neck as my "bad arm" etc., but rather as my injured arm, my healing neck, my tender shoulder, etc.  It was validating to hear Lende's physical therapist reiterate this idea.  "She . . . wouldn't let me call it my 'bad leg.'  She said if I started doing that, it would never heal."

All in all, just some good stuff about community, about faith, about healing, about small town life, about life in Alaska.