I want people to like me. My friends (obviously), people at work, the people reading this. I’m pretty sure I should be embarrassed by how much it matters to me what people think, but it does matter all the same. The older I get, the more I’m okay with the idea that since some people aren’t really my cup of tea, it’s fair that I’m not everyone’s cup of tea either. But that means that I’m okay with about 2% of people not liking me, […]
Frustrating But Ultimately Rewarding
What does it mean to like a book? Does it mean you find it compelling and want to keep reading it when you put it down? Does it mean you think it’s well-written? Does it mean that you connect with the characters and care about what happens to them? Does it mean you don’t want it to end? Does it mean you want to read it again? Or is it just something ineffable, unquantifiable, that marks the dividing line between “liked it” and “didn’t like […]
Destined To Be A Modern-Day YA Classic
The town I grew up in was just this side of rural by the time I hit high school: they put up the first full stoplight (not just a blinking red or yellow) when I was in eighth grade. Our first McDonald’s came that year too, or the year after. I sometimes wonder what my life would have been like if we’d had the internet in high school. The internet was around when I was in high school, of course (I graduated in 2003). Everyone […]
Not A Drop To Drink
Almost four years ago now, I moved from Michigan to Nevada. In Michigan, I lived right on the water, on an inland lake. Like, open the door and the water was no more than a stone’s throw away. I’ve been swimming in the summer and on ice skates in the winter for as long as I can remember. Moving to Nevada was a very real change from that. Nevada is the driest state in the country in a good year, and we haven’t been having […]
Off With Her Head
Divorced, beheaded, died; divorced, beheaded, survived. It’s how you remember what became of the six wives of Henry XIII. That there’s even a way to help you remember the love life of a monarch whose reign is 500 years in the past speaks to the enduring cultural relevancy of Henry and his wives. And if you were to ask someone off the street to name you just one of them, I’d put my money on it that they’d name Anne Boleyn. Witch, feminist before her […]