Lent and Gratitude Writing

It is the season of lent.  My daughters and I were discussing our spiritual practices for the upcoming season.  One of my daughters, my 15 year old, is preparing to give up meat.  I think I might follow her.  I decided I would not buy any coffee out anywhere since that is a place that I can blow some money.  I also saw someone else's idea to do a daily writing of gratitude letters that you send to a person.  That one struck a cord with me.  I plan to do that.  So I will begin today by thinking of the 40 people that I plan to write letters to. I am excited about this opportunity and hope to make this a daily practice.
Rob
Emma
Isabella
Mom
Dad
Jennifer
Julie
Gordon and Kathy
Mary Lou
Peggy
Jessica
Robin
Annie
Laura
Heather G
Heather W
Denise
Kathy
Pastor Tommy
Charette
Jennifer S.
Samantha
Deirdre
Becky and Pirate Granny
Teresa
Toni
Trisha and Jerry
Patty C.
Lou and Pat
Cooper
Jesse
Jerome
Alekai
Beau
Rachel
Amber
Emily
Ashley
Cecilia
Daryl

Dear Daryl,
I wanted to take this opportunity during Lent to write letters to 40 different people to show my gratitude.  You are on my list of people for whom I am grateful.  My life is busy with my two kids, working as a counselor, and working toward licensure for my counseling license.  Therefore, without a village I know my kids would not be making the progress they are now.  Emma absolutely adores you.  You are on her short list of most influential important people.  I have teachers like that, too but not many.  You have inspired her to follow her passion in music.  You have created safe spaces for her to be accepted and to accept others.  I hope she always stays in contact with you because if she followed a similar life trajectory as you-following your passion in music, helping others, traveling, staying in close relationship with family, and living life with zest...well, I would be darn happy.  I don't know how much you know about Bella, but she has always required more energy and more of everything we have to give as parents and I often wonder how that impacts Emma.  You know Emma; she's so flexible that she has never once complained but as a mom I worry that she doesn't get the same level of energy from us.  That's a huge reason I am thankful for you and what you mean to her.  You mean a lot to me, too.  We are not able to show our gratitude in extravagant ways but hopefully these words will let you know that we are so thankful.
Sincerely, SB

Dear Teresa,
I wanted to take a moment to tell you how much I appreciate the work you do.  I know the countless hours that go in over the actual hours and it's too many!  I appreciate that you are always working to cross every t and dot every i for kids.  You have been such a support to Bella and to me and I just want you to know that I am so very thankful for you for that. 

So far it's been a good 2020 for my reading life.  Our library has added a lot of great books to the audio service and I've been able to snag a few good ones as well as some print books.  So the books I've read in 2020 include

Red at the Bone-I'm counting it for 2020 because it was December 30ish when I downloaded and listened to it.  Oh, my goodness!  The generational family ties, brokenness, and race challenges all wrapped up in this gem of a book.  It was lovely and a super quick read!

Talking to Strangers (audible)-so interesting.  I highly recommend listening to this Malcolm Gladwell book.  I decided to go for this one after hearing his interview on Armchair Expert Podcast with Dax Shepherd.  The cool thing about the Malcolm Gladwell book is that he reads the book himself and I love his voice and inflection but he also intersperses actual footage from the events mentioned in his book.  This book also got to me because my town is going through some heated race challenges as a black city councilman is up for recall after declaring a black state of emergency when a police man a few towns over (fort worth) shot and killed an unarmed black lady in her own house playing video games. https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/20/us/atatiana-jefferson-death-officer-indicted/index.html
The lawyer, Lee Merritt listed in this new story has also recently visited my town to be a presence at the city council meeting.  It's messy and I definitely learned how we don't always 'default to good' after this book.  Highlighted but interwoven through other stories to highlight concepts brought forth by Gladwell is the Sandra Bland case.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Sandra_Bland

The Alchemist-Second time reading and I also listened to this one and it is lovely.  A young man finds his way and learns the world is out to help him.

While the City  Slept-I knew nothing about this case but read the description.  It was about a man with mental health challenges and a horrific crime committed that left a beautiful soul raped and murdered.  The story is one of so much more than a specific crime.  It details the lives of the people in this case including homosexuality, school to prison pipeline (although not specifically said that way), the lack of mental health services for those uninsured or underinsured. This book spoke to me because I see this probably daily.  We know of a need but brush it aside because there is not enough to help the people at society's fringes.  We hope they don't do somethign terrible but in some cases can almost predict a bad outcome.  We feel our hands are tied.  It was a hard listen but an important one.  The author won a Pulitzer for his journalism reporting on this case.  It happened in Seattle, which I would have assumed was a very progressive area who worked hard to meet the needs of it's most delicate.  I found that in this case that did not happen.  On a happy note, it was after I read the book and was doing a little digging that I realized the wife of the slain victim did a benefit concert with my musical hero, Brandi Carlile.  I am very happy I stumbled accross this book.  I will never forget this story.

Books Goals and Book Lists

I put a questions to my facebook friends (ok, I still get on facebook-just working on less time spent there) to capture their fave books of 2019.  Not necessarily writing in 2019 but read.  It was a great evening spent making plans to read certain books based on friends' recommendations.  I set a goal to read 100 books in 2019.  I read somewhere around 30.  I listened to a lot of podcasts but I just did not quite get to my lofty goal.  I hear in inspired some (my sister in law) to read 100 books and she came a lot closer-65ish and she told me she was not on social media much so I like where this is going.

Anyway, here is a list of books I want to read in 2020.  Some were my own discoveries and some (most) were friend recommendations-

Where the Crawdads Sing-Delia Owens
The Overdue Life of Amy Byler-Kelly Harms
City of Girls-Elizabeth Gilbert
Eleanor Oliphant is Absoutely Fine-Gail Honeyman
The Library Book-Susan Orlean
Next Year in Havana-Chanel Cleeton
Orphan Train-Christina Baker Kline
Quit Like a Woman-Holly Whitaker
We are the Luckiest-Laura Mckowen
Love Thy Neighbor:  A Muslim Doctor's Struggle for Home in Rural America-Ayaz Virji
The Bright Hour-Nina Riggs
Supper Club-Lara Williams
Where'd You Go Bernadette-Maria Semple
Are You Sleeping-Kathleeen Barber
The Distance Between Us-Reyna Grande
The Great Believers-Rebecca Makkai
News of the World-Paulette Jiles
We are the Weather-Jonathan Safran Foer
The Huntress-Kate Quinn
The Alice Network-Kate Quinn
The Give of Stars-Jojo Mayes
Before We Were Yours-Lisa Wingate
Harlee Loco-Rayya Elias
We Were the Lucky Ones-Georgia Hunter
Beneath a Scarlett Sky-Mark Sullivan
The Devil in the White City-Erik Larson
The Monk of Mokha-Dave Eggers
Lincoln in the Bardo-George Saunders
The Warmth of Other Suns-Isabell Wilkerson
White Trash-Nancy Isenberg
The Gone World-Tom Sweterlitsch
What the What-Dave Eggers
White Fragility-Robin DiAngelo and Michael Erick Dyson
The Tatooist of Auschwitz-Heather Morris
The Institute-Stephen King
Walking Each Other Home-Ram Dass and Mirabai Bush
How to Grow An Addict-J.A. Wright
Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist-Sunil Yapa
Witnessing Ted-Carol Poteat with Ted Wiard
Between the World and Me-Ta-Nehisi Coates
It Didn't Start with You-Mark Wolynn
Shamless-Nadi Bolz-Weber
Jason Molina-Riding with the Ghost-Erin Osmon
The Dutch House-Ann Patchett
The Collected Stories of Eduora Welty-Eudora Welty
Never Stop Walking-Christina Rickardson
Chasing the Scream-Johann Hari
Untamed-Glennon Doyle Melton
Wolf Pack-Abby Wambach
The Hate You Give-Angie Thomas
The Bhagavad Gita-Eknath Easwaran
Perfect Peace-Daniel Black
Cherry-Mary Karr
Carry On Warrier-Glennon Doyle Melton
Mother, Mother Koren Zailckas
Option B-Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant
The Signature of All Things-Elizabeth Gilbert
Me Before You-Jojo Mayes
AFter You-Jojo Mayes
The Goldfinch-Donna Tartt
Wool-Hugh Howey
Just Kids-Patti Smith
My Fair Junkie-Amy Dresner
Blackout-Sarah Hepola
Left to Tell-Immaculee Ilibagiza
Talking to Strangers-Malcolm Gladwell

Why this Blog?

I love to read and I love to write so this is a win/win combo for me and hopefully, you!  I wake up most days with words dancing in my head.  Sometimes I write them down.  Most days I just visit with them and then they leave.  Hopefully, this will help me capture words of my own as well as celebrate, review and revel in words of others.

I've wasted far too much time on social media and going down rabbit trails.  The apple feature of screen time usage report has really shown me that and I want to do something different this year.  So, instead of slinking down the dark holes of mind numbing social media, I will give myself limits and read instead.