Week One

We’re just over a week into the new year and I feel like it’s a good time to take stock of how things are going so far. It’s been so cold and dark and a little gloomy lately which has honestly made it easy to crush my reading goal of 25 minutes in 25. The only thing I want to do lately is immerse myself in a hot bubble bath, under a pile of covers in bed or somewhere warm and cozy, all with a book in hand. I’m writing this right now in the sweet little local wine shop,  Wine Collective, in Shelby. I’m sitting in a room made festive with white lights around the window and a view of our historic court square sipping a glass of rose. 

My book club chose God of the Woods for our latest read and I ended up devouring it in a matter of days. Liz Moore is a master storyteller and wordsmith and I found myself staying up late more than once, caught up in the twists and turns of the tale. Set in the Adirondacks at a summer camp for the wealthy, it tells the story of a banker family whose beloved young son mysteriously disappears one afternoon after an annual decadent summer party. He is never found and the event casts a shadow over the family, nearby town and the camp and nature 

preserve where the boy went missing. Then, about 13 years later, his sister also vanishes. It’s a story of family secrets, betrayals, heartache and hope. It’s also about women’s rights (or lack therof), the gap between the privileged and those who serve them and the lengths we’ll go to protect the ones we love. 

I learned a few new words too. For me, her writing is everything I want in a book. 

After I finished it, I felt a little lost and bereft and had to cast around in my stacks for a bit to find something I could lose myself in again. I ended up picking up Abigail Thomas’ newest book, “Still Life at Eighty” and as usual, it’s like sitting down with an old friend and catching up. Her words are a balm, a piece of good chocolate you savor slowly and I’ve been taking my time reading it. There are so many gems it’s hard to pick one, but one of my favorite quotes so far is “Always take a cookie when the plate is being passed.” If there is an opportunity, a chance to do something new, fun or beneficial, take the cookie. Life is finite and there are a limited number of cookies you will be offered, so even if it’s not the “right time” just take it.

Another motto my sister and I have adopted this year is “It’s not that serious,” because let’s be real, it rarely is. I keep thinking about how temporary all this is and how much we waste. Time, energy, let’s live and be stunned by it. I’ve tried to write a book many times over and I keep getting stumped. Maybe this year I actually do it. 

In other news, my friend and I have planned our first book swap party, set to take place next month, and I’ve got some big hiking goals for this year (the Lord willing and creek don’t rise) and I want to travel. I’ve been stationary too long and it makes me feel a little crazy.

Hope your 2025 is off to a fulfilling and gentle start.

Welcome, 2025

Cheers to the New Year

New Year’s Eve.

It’s 9 p.m. and I’m on my couch at home with my slippers on and the distant sound of fireworks crackling somewhere in the neighborhood while Natalie’s music thumps overhead. Last year at this time I was celebrating New Year’s Eve in New York City with friends. At the stroke of midnight, we ran through Central Park with hundreds of other people while the most brilliant fireworks exploded in the sky, the booms echoing eerily off the skyscrapers around us and the energy of a thousand souls pushed our feet forward. It looks a little different this year but that’s OK. Nat and I took a drive at sunset, chasing cotton candy pink clouds and reminiscing about some of the familiar places we passed. Then we ordered a pizza when we got home and baked a chocolate cake. I might not even stay up until midnight and if I do, it will probably be unintentional. 

I’ve been thinking about resolutions and decided I’ll definitely have a reading goal because book goals are always good goals.

Gretchen Rubin, the New York Times bestselling author, speaker and podcaster, has started a challenge called Read 25 in ‘25, which is the very achievable goal of reading 25 minutes a day, every day. I like it, and I am going to join in. Sometimes just picking up a book and getting started is the hardest part and then next thing I know, 25 minutes turns into 45.

So, let’s do less mindless scrolling and more reading this year!

In all the chaos and heartbreak of life, books are such a little treat, a magic carpet that whisks us away from our own world and into the worlds of others. I meet people, become immersed into their lives, learn things, hear their secrets and fears and triumphs and tragedies. Like other forms of art, words have the ability to feed and heal the soul.

My sister and I both bought Elizabeth Strout’s latest book – Tell Me Everything – for each other for Christmas so we’re both reading it at the same time. I always find her books to be like a comfortable sweater on a cold day or a hot bowl of chicken noodle soup. I get so absorbed into the story, I feel like I’m there, in that little town in Maine with all of its idiosyncratic characters. I hate to leave her little world and enter back into mine.

It’s a drizzly, grey end of December day, perfect for snuggling up on the couch with my very good dog and a blanket and Strout. 

In addition to my reading goal, I have others because I can never resist making goals for the New Year, even small, silly ones. It’s just fun and it always feels like the new year is a blank slate, so fresh and hopeful and just waiting to be filled with wonderful things. 

I want to take fun trips and visit new places and eat good food and cook in the kitchen and make more good memories. South Dakota is at the top of the  list of places to go this year and I can’t wait. I want to spend time with the people I love. Natalie graduates this year and we’re planning a trip to celebrate this milestone.

I want to go to concerts and visit museums. My friend Ann and I have also started filling up a little glass olive jar with slips of paper and on the paper are things we want to do and adventures we want to take. Every day we text each other with a new idea – “add that to the jar!” We say. There is everything in the jar, from sipping wine at a new wine shop to hosting a book swap party to biking across Cuba and visiting a historic leper colony museum in Louisiana. 

I want to write more and hike more. I sort of abandoned both this year but my heart and soul need my words and wild places. I told Ann I was going to write about our jar and its adventures as we complete them and then I’m going to post them here even though I sometimes cringe at my words.

I want to study Botany. I love native plants and I want to learn more. I want to spend less time frittering away hours on nothing and make the most of the time I have. 

So, that’s what I want for 2025. More wonder, more joy, more purposeful experiences and love and healing and small connections. 

Cheers!

City love

New York City

I grew up in rural Alberta where the loudest sounds were the wind combing through the tops of the poplars in the backyard like ocean waves and coyotes yipping at night in the dark. My childhood was shaped by wide open expanses of sunny canola fields, gravel roads as straight as an arrow and the river carving through the sturgeon valley. Although I loved the northern summers that allowed me to read Lad the Dog until the last climactic fight at the very end, and it was magic to wake up at midnight to smoky aurora borealis crackling across the dark sky outside my bedroom window in winter, the wandering dreamer in me craved the bustling noise and color of a city. Maybe I felt it would ease my loneliness. Maybe we always crave what we don’t have. Civilization often felt a long ways away and to my impatient eyes, life was passing me by and I was tasting none of it. But life has a way of carrying you along and life sometimes allows you pieces of your dreams. I don’t take it for granted. I’ve seen a few cities around the world – Antigua, London, Florence, Almaty – and I hope to see many more before I die. I’m hopeful life will grant me that. In the meantime I revel in the fact that I’ll be going to Philadelphia soon and I am still feeling lingering pleasure over my New York City trip, the second time I’ve been. I fell in love with that city. Walking down Bleecker street with a cup of coffee and then strolling through Washington Square Park was a DREAM. I wanted to never leave. It was all magic, the brownstones, the people playing card games in the park, the buildings whose tops were obscured by mist, the steam escaping from the grates, the graffiti, the noise, the happy chaos, the sway of subway trains and the friendly vibe of the neighborhoods and the little bookstores and Central Park and the diner where we ate lunch and the High Line, and the museum with the Georgia O’ Keefe painting and the Brass Monkey where I drank too many Pick Me Girls and running the length of Manhattan and seeing the New Jersey palisades and getting drenched in a downpour the last two miles and the quirky Jane Hotel and wonderful food and friendly people and diversity and so much human joy and angst and pleasure and and and… Sigh. I think I was truly supposed to have grown up there. But my heart has room to encompass it all. The city and the wild, natural places I love. I need them both. They are my yin and yang.

How I lost my wallet and found my faith in humanity

Life can be harsh. 

Every time I open the newspaper or scroll through my phone, I see the worst of humanity splashed all over the pages: nature exacting her pound of flesh, inflammatory politics, abuse of power, lack of empathy and so much anger and hate. When a 6-year-old child is beaten to death for drinking out of a toilet, it’s hard to hold onto hope for this world. 

But even when it feels hard to see and the darkness crowds out the light, I am reminded that goodness is out there and we just need to choose to see it. Acts of kindness are all around us, and sometimes one small act sparks another. Even a small candle can light up the darkness.

Last night, I made a late night trip to Walmart to pick up my daughter’s favorite salt and vinegar Pringles and a few other items. I was in a hurry but after drinking a coffee and a bottle of water a couple of hours earlier, I was desperate for a bathroom and resigned myself to using the Walmart facility. After using the bathroom I rushed out and grabbed a drink, sandwich from the deli, strawberry cupcakes and chips, juggling everything in my arms. Women’s shorts don’t have pockets, a real travesty, and it wasn’t until I approached the self check-out that my heart sank with the realization that I had my keys and phone but no wallet. It had to be in the bathroom. In a panic I dropped everything on the closest surface and returned to the bathroom stall where I had the memory of setting it down on top of the toilet paper dispenser and no subsequent memory of picking it up again. It was gone. Very, very gone. I retraced my steps in the faint hope that I had dropped it or set it down somewhere along the way, but it was nowhere in sight. I stopped at customer service where an overworked and underpaid employee was handling a merchandise return and asked if anyone had turned in a wallet. No, she said, no one had. 

In despair, my mind and stomach churning, I walked empty handed back to my car already taking stock of the losses. $150 in hard-earned cash. Debit card, credit card, social security card, house keys, gift cards, drivers license. My whole life. I immediately logged into my bank account and canceled the cards, and then feeling surprisingly naked and vulnerable and empty, I returned home. When I told my friend what had happened, he suggested going through the bathroom trash can, thinking someone may have taken the cash and dumped the rest. He persuaded me it was worth a shot and we headed back to Walmart. I half-heartedly poked around among the damp paper towels and random bits of flotsam and jetsam but my wallet was not there. I cursed Walmart people and their lack of scruples, convinced that if I had lost it somewhere else, it might still be in the bathroom. I stopped at customer service once more on the way out and the woman at the counter said she had just arrived at work and didn’t know if anyone had turned in anything. The first customer service woman came out of another room with a big grin on her face. “

I was just thinking about you,” she said, holding up my wallet.

Someone had turned it in. 

I nearly cried with joy. Instant relief flooded through me and I felt as if the world suddenly brightened three shades. When I opened it, everything was still there, including the cash.

I don’t know who turned it in, but I am so grateful to them.

It got me thinking about all the other times I’ve witnessed goodness. I think of the friends who regularly donate blood, which literally save lives, and of the people in our community who work to help those without homes or resources and the group who walks early in the morning in my neighborhood and picks up trash along the way and the local emergency responders collecting donations for Kentucky flood victims and the people spreading joy and beauty through their art and even the smallest things, like the way a man recently told me that when he was a teenager working at Publix he had to tell people “have a good day” and at first it annoyed him having to say those words but after awhile he saw the power that simple friendly phrase could have.

So, today I am celebrating the good – and the return of my wallet – while I wait on that new debit card to arrive, a reminder to me to have faith and hold fast onto the belief that there is hope for us after all.