Does one get a badge for living through Firefly Lane? You’re crying, I’m not crying? 😭
Archive for May, 2023
This says it all, includes so many…
Rootless by Krystle Zara Appiah
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This was a difficult read. I didn’t initially relate to any of the characters, except for not fitting in. I think everyone has had the occasion where they find themselves in a group they don’t feel is for them. Efe finds herself there most of her life.
At one point, I did find myself paying closer attention. I think it was when the couple found themselves expecting a baby. Yes, I was raised during the 50s and 60s. Women were to be barefoot, pregnant, and happy about it. Well, throwing up and being tired all the time didn’t fit with how I was supposed to feel. Cultural expectations and my own clashed as women’s lib was showing that we had choices. Too late for me. I was already entirely indoctrinated.
Still, after the babies were born, I found they taught me all I needed. They knew how to do the baby parts, and I learned the mama parts. I know for a fact that I was fortunate. Being a mom isn’t built into our genes. No more than being a dad comes with the part he played in the baby-making. And they have had their share of expectations. Now smush those ideas and realities into play, and every marriage and parenting situation brings challenges no one expected.
Efe and Sam come into parenting the same way, full of expectations and realities that don’t fit the stories they were supposed to believe. I can see how poor Efe and other pregnant women can feel the way they do. There can be no normal with mental and emotional issues in the mix. Each person has to learn their way. Here is an excellent story to show how understanding your partner, even when you don’t show what love is. Efe does her best out of love. Sam does his best out of love. Yet, the story doesn’t go according to expectations. I feel like I want to give everyone a hug and move on. No amount of talking can help the emotional issues at hand.
By the way, as indifferent as I felt at the beginning of the book, I suggest having the Kleenex handy. I was in shock and had difficulty sleeping after the story ended.
You would think by now it would sink in: Daytime naps don’t help ease insomnia. Yet, when I’m tired and hurty during the day, that bed calls to me. I snuggle into the covers and soon find I’ve sunk into dreamland. I sleep so much better during the day. I keep the television on providing just enough distraction to slip right into a layer of the linen life. Sometimes I wake and find a valley in the bedding where my body sank in.
I don’t like being stuck in this habit so I plan to sleep with the Kindle Fire playing favorites from Netflix. Hopefully, I will see a more awake face tomorrow in the mirror above the bathroom sink.
I have a few other projects but the progress is even less than these. I’m wondering how summer will affect progress. With walks and biking indoors I’m moving more.
My husband and I love to watch shows about animals or nature, especially on the weekends. Veterinarian shows are our go to to have on while writing or other jobs that we need the visual distraction to rest our eyes on when looking up.
Somehow weekends have become weekdays. Today we were watching zoo shows or one about elephants. The thing I do remember was it was on National Geographic. Suddenly we looked up and it was a documentary about Patagonia. It’s called Wild Life. I loved it.
While we were watching that my friend IMed me about a show she enjoyed on Tubi called Restart the Earth. I thought it would be similar. But no. Still I’m enjoying a disaster movie that reminds me of The Last of Us.
What have you been watching?
I can’t remember a time I didn’t have a dog. Tramping through fields and forests with Granger is always one of the highlights of my day, not just because it’s so beneficial for my mental and physical health, but seeing how happy it makes Granger to run, racing against the wind, ears flapping, brings me […]
Dog owners PLEASE read!
I can’t believe I read this before. But it was in 2016, so I may give my poor memory a break. Here is what I wrote way back then. I like it so much better than I would have written today. So here is a repeat. Still worth the read. January La Voy’s narration kept this interesting all the way through.
~~~June 23, 2016~~~
What a woman! I was very impressed with this book. I do not usually read non-fiction. But this was the first book available for Kindle from my local library. I downloaded the Audible version to help hold my attention to the text.
If there were any book that could bring the plight of women to light, it is this book. Here we have a woman who had a family who was college educated and encouraged their offspring to seek the highest education possible. This woman went to Indonesia to study the poor, especially the women.
Don’t think about this book as an extension of the President. She was her own person even before her son was born. It seems she had all the breaks, got to travel and all, but she had the courage of her convictions and goals to help others.
I think many women who read this will see a part of themselves reflected back. Had my mother had the opportunity that Stanley Ann Durham had, I think she would have been a happier person. Having a happy, well define parent could only result in happy, well-defined children.
Finally the heels are done on this bamboo yarn pair of socks. The leg and cuff are left. That doesn’t take long. So maybe these will be featured on Finished Friday?
Four miles on the stationary bike and three walked. Woo hoo!!! I’m tired! I hope all this starts paying off somehow.
Darswords 
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