The Simple Woman's Daybook -- Saturday, August 21, 2010

Hosted by Peggy @ The Simple Woman's Daybook

Outside my window... Sun streaming through the front blinds.

I am thinking... I'm glad I know where my home is, at least for the next few months.

I am praying... for health and energy.

I am thankful... for free tickets to a local amusement park and the great time we all had there last night!

I am going... to the doctor on Tuesday.

I am reading... Faithful Place by Tana French 

I am hoping... to keep using the trampoline for exercise!

I am hearing... Sofia talking about doughnuts and Alex rustling in the kitchen

From the kitchen... frozen homemade cookie dough to take to the clothes swap today.

Around the house... unpacking a little bit more -- settling in a little deeper to my new living quarters.

One of my favorite things... long, strong hugs from someone who loves me --- even if they make the tears return.

Here is picture for thought I am sharing...

                                                 M & F reading the same book.

Book Beginnings & Friday 56 -- Friday, August 20, 2010 -- The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King

Hosted by Storytime with Tonya and Friends
Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog.
*Post a link along with your post back to this blog.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

HAPPY FRIDAY!

I'm reading The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King.  Page 56 is actually largely empty (it's the end of a chapter) so I'm just going to share the last sentence on the page:

Then the world exploded in a racket of tearing metal and crackling trees, the screams of three human voices, and an unbelievable confusion of sound and pain and turmoil as we tumbled end over end and fell crying into the dark.

Cover via Amazon

Book Beginnings on Friday is a meme hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Anyone can participate; just share the opening sentence of your current read, making sure that you include the title and author so others know what you're reading. If you like, share with everyone why you do, or do not, like the sentence.



And again from The God of the Hive:

Two clever London gentlemen. 

This is a great beginning for this book because this part of the plot continues in small and somewhat obscure vignettes throughout the story, surrounded by longer chapters involving the main characters.  I haven't finished it yet so I haven't seen how it will all play out but every time I  encountered one of these two "clever London gentlemen"  I was surprised -- I had almost forgotten about them.  Then I had to ponder how their actions were affecting/influencing the rest of the story.   Good stuff. 

Being Wrong by Kathryn Schulz

"If you mortgaged your family's future on your faith in Bernie Madoff; if you hitched your whole wagon to a doctrine or deity you no longer believe in; if you were wrong about someone you loved and the kind of life you thought the two of you would live together; if you have betrayed your own principles in any of the countless dark ways we can surprise ourselves over the course of a lifetime:  if any of this or anything like has happened to you, then you have suffered in the space of pure wrongness."  Being Wrong:  Adventures in the Margin of Error by Kathryn Schulz, p.187

Cover via Amazon

I picked up Being Wrong by Kathryn Schulz at the library after noticing it was on my Amazon recommendations.  Schulz explores why it is so hard for us to admit being wrong (especially without the phrase "I was wrong, but..."), the plus side of error, big mistakes and trivial mistakes, why everyone makes mistakes, how we view those mistakes in retrospect, the process we go through when we change our minds about something we were once certain about, and so much more.


If you are a non-fiction reader, you will probably want to check this one out.  There are some drier parts of the book but Schulz's debut is also full of fascinating research and anecdotes.


A few excerpts:


As with dying, we recognize erring as something that happens to everyone, without feeling that it is either plausible or desirable that it will happen to us.  Accordingly, when mistakes happen anyway, we typically respond as if they hadn't, or as if they shouldn't have:  we deny them, wax defensive about them, ignore them, downplay them, or blame them on somebody else.  p.6

Doctors don't teach medical students the theory of bodily humors, and astronomy professors don't teach their students to calculate the velocity of the fifty-five concentric spheres Aristotle thought composed the universe.  This is practical and efficient pedagogy, but it shores up our tacit assumption that current belief is identical with true belief, and it reinforces our general sense of rightness.  p. 21

Believing something on the basis of messy, sparse, limited information really is how we err.  But it is also how we think.  What makes us right is what makes us wrong.  p.122

In the optimistic model of wrongness, error is not a sign that our past selves were failures and falsehoods.  Instead, it is one of those forces, like sap and sunlight, that imperceptibly helps another organic entity -- us human beings -- to grow up. p. 289

As soon as we think we are right about something, we narrow our focus, attending only to details that support our belief, or ceasing to listen altogether.  By contrast, when we are aware that we could be wrong, we are far more inclined to hear other people out.  p. 310



And finally,


Being wrong is hard and humbling, and sometimes even dangerous, but in the end it is a journey, and a story.  Who really wants to stay home and be right when you can don your armor, spring up on your steed and go forth to explore the world?  True, you might get lost along the way, get stranded in a swamp, have a scare at the edge of a cliff; thieves might steal your gold, brigands might imprison you in a cave, sorcerers might turn you into a toad -- but what of that?  To fuck up is to find adventure:  it is in that spirit that this book is written.  p.42-43

WWW Wednesdays -- August 18, 2010

To play along, just answer the following three questions……

• What are you currently reading?
• What did you recently finish reading?
• What do you think you will read next?

Currently reading:

Cover via Amazon

Cover via Amazon

• The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King
• Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error by Kathryn Schulz 
• Theodosia and the Staff of Osiris by R.L. Travers

Recently finished:

Cover of The Night Fairy

• The Night Fairy by Laura Amy Schlitz & illustrated by Angela Barrett
•  The Jesus Mystery: Astonishing Clues to the True Identities of Jesus and Paul by Lena Einhorn
  

Up next:

Cover of Faithful Place: A Novel

• Faithful Place:  A Novel  by Tana French

Teaser Tuesday -- Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme hosted by Miz B of Should Be Reading and asks you to :
1. Grab your current read
2. Open to a random page
3 . Share 2 "teaser" sentences also citing the title of the book and the author and in that way people can have great recommendations if they like the "teaser".
4. Please avoid spoilers!

Nobody here is Cassie.   I'm safe. 

~ p. 92, Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Brutal, harsh, and relentless.  Laurie Halse Anderson (author of Speak) has crafted a very intense YA novel about Lia, an eighteen-year-old who is anorexic.  Lia's once best friend (the aforementioned Cassie) dies and Lia struggles to remain in "control" while deeply desiring positive connections with her mother, father, stepmother and stepsister. 

I would be curious to hear what someone who has struggled with an eating disorder (or those close to them) would have to say about the story.  The way that different people chose to respond to Lia and to her anorexia and cutting reminded me of Still Alice -- in that I'm fascinated by the variety of possible responses to a given crisis and how incredibly difficult it is to know which response is most helpful or effective in the long term. 

The Elijah character ever so slightly didn't work for me -- but it may be that Anderson just made him so real and three-dimensional that I was sad and disappointed -- You know, just like real-life with real-life people. 

I would certainly recommend this book -- Anderson really gets inside Lia's mind and helps make sense of anorexia for those who have never been there.

Deep Breaths -- Take Two

Image via Wikipedia

I've been going through some major changes and transitions in my life right now, giant, scary, hard, sad changes and transitions.  Overwhelming, exhausting, sob-inducing, confusing, tricky, all-encompassing changes and transitions.  Overdue and potentially life- and light-bringing changes and transitions.

Image via Wikipedia

I've been staying on the lighter side here on the blog -- perhaps just as a space where I can keep pretending everything is normal/status quo/okay.

Image by woodleywonderworks via Flickr

I'm pretty sure that at some point I'll start sharing more on here -- perhaps after I figure out the balance between this being my space to process and share and this being a public space that anyone can read.  Between being fair to everyone involved and being good to myself, giving myself some space to think aloud and find encouragement.

Image by LensCat via Flickr

Love and peace to you all on this Monday morning.

Image via Wikipedia

Deep breaths

THE DAILY GROOVE ~ by Scott Noelle
www.enjoyparenting.com/dailygroove

The PATH Program is for parents like you!
It's easy and fun to participate in, and it can
make a HUGE difference in your parenting...
www.enjoyparenting.com/path/info

:: Letting Go of HOW ::

Creativity involves exploring the unknown. So if you
want to *parent* creatively, you need to accept that
you often won't have the comfort of knowing, in
advance, *how* it's all going to work out.

In other words, creative parenting is what you might
call a "faith journey." You're constantly facing the
unknown and surrendering to it. When you surrender to
the unknown, you open a channel to inspiration and new
knowledge.

Today, if at some point your child's desire seems
incompatible with yours, tell yourself that there must
be a way that both of you can feel satisfied, even
though you don't yet know what that is.

"I don't need to know how... I trust that a way will
be revealed."

Remember that the most creative solutions often defy
logic!

http://dailygroove.net/how

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Copyright (c) 2010 by Scott Noelle