My Favorite Books of 2023
When this year started, I set myself a challenge on Goodreads to read 100 books. Currently, I have read 159 books, so I guess you could say I overperformed. Those are print books, eBooks, and audiobooks. I make no distinctions. There’s nothing on the list under 100 pages, either, so I didn’t really count individually published short stories, though I did count the collections. I love books and I love […]
Congratulations I’m Sorry
As the year ends, I find myself in a time of transition. Some things are good. Great, even. On December 5th, which was the first anniversary of our first date, my boyfriend, Jimmy, and I had brunch at the same place we’d first met a year ago. He’d invited my mom and dad to join us. And after we’d eaten, he asked me to marry him. I said yes, of […]
Confessions of a Control Freak
It’s amazing how you think you have yourself figured out, but then something will happen that makes you understand you had everything wrong. You didn’t know yourself, and that’s a little bit scary, but it can also fuel your own sense of wonder. If you maintain the capacity to surprise yourself, your life will never be boring. I had myself pegged and an easy-going free spirit. A real ‘go-with-the-flow’ type […]
A note about something I’m struggling with
I’ve had to get real about some bad habits I’ve developed. And it’s kind of funny that I’m posting this a few days after my social media post, but that’s probably also part of the problem. Basically, I’m on social media too much. I hesitate to call it an addiction, because I don’t know if it meets the same criteria as regards to what is actually going on in the […]
Social Media Showdown
Twitter used to be the place for artists, writers, journalists, and other professionals to hang out online. It had great discoverability, and people built huge followings seemingly from scratch. People sold books, connected with agents and editors, and became (sometimes unfortunately) celebrities based on the pithy comments they posted about matters both serious and inane. At its height, it had over 528.3 million monthly active users. If you wanted to […]
The Truth About Habits?
A while back, when I was going through the process of restructuring my life in a way that would allow me to be productive, I did a deep dive into habit formation. I read a bunch of blog posts, as well as James Clear’s Atomic Habits and Mark Manson’s The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck. All of this was instructive, and I did look at my habits and […]