Book Review: By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept: A Novel of Forgiveness by Paulo Coelho

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
The heroine is Pilar a young woman who is resigned that her life will not have anything extrodinary in it - it will be working, coming home to a marriage of companionship more then love and just doing what society expects of her. Her former childhood friend contacts her and together on a short journey they experience a spiritual path through admiting their love of each other and letting go of fears. I was caught up in the characters and their journey that carried me through the great Pyrenees. The book reminded me of the triumphs, fears, joy and pain associated with love as well as religion and our spiritual journey. It is often critized that Coehlo isn't writing "real" literture. But of course I disagree as he is my favorite author. His stories might have simiple life lessons but he often tells it in ways that seem to touch many people -- and I am one of those people. They are good simple lessons that come from Coehlo's heart so it is hard not to react to them. I am usually one turned off by overt conservative religous tones in books but Coehlo always has a twist on those religious themes that makes them far from being conservative. His words often make me look at my life -- my spiritual path, my life journey and the love in my life.
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Gratitude Friday

1. Obama's speech last night moved me
2. That although the bread loaf that I made the other day was smaller then I thought it would be -- it worked, it looked good and most importantly it tasted good!
3. A really good DNC -- renewed hope in democrates for me
4. For several good chats this week with friends
5. For naps in the middle of the afternoon...sun streaming in the window

Blog Hopping

I blog hop quite a bit. I go to one person's blog and hop from a link there to a blog and then hop from there to another and so on. I can really lose lots of time that way. But in the process I laugh, I find inspiration, I find touching stories of love and life challenges.

So I thought I would start sharing some blog hopping finds....

Pretty Paper Blog posted an entry for a project to help jump start those projects we all want to do...she created a Creative Juice jar. Read more about it here.

The Happiness Project - I have only read a handful for entries but several messages that spoke to me.

In my blog hopping someone linked to this...

Hope Revolution -- I would really love to participate in it. From the website: "When I hid my hope notes around the city and documented it online, my inbox was flooded with messages from people who were inspired to do the same in their communities. I was bewildered, but I guess word of mouth is powerful! It propagated through the Internet like wildfire. So, I decided to develop this website to continue the hope revolution."

Hillary hit it out of the park and it is still going....

Oh my....Hillary Clinton did an AMAZING job tonight! She really pumped up the energy of the DNC. We watch MSNBC and the crowd outside with Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews were even more energized. I feel she did a great job at UNITY.

A few favorite lines...

"No Way, No How, No McCain!" -- Great line and sound bite!

"John McCain says the economy is fundamentally sound. He doesn’t think there’s a health care crisis, and wants to privatize Social Security, and thinks it’s OK for women to receive unequal pay for equal work. It's fitting that George Bush and John McCain will be appearing together in the Twin Cities because it's awfully hard to tell them apart." -- GREAT GREAT line! I was laughing. And with family in the Twin Cities, you know I feel for them having the twins there for the Republican Convention.

"To my supporters, the Sisters of the Traveling Pantsuits, thank you." -- Very cute line. The audience laughed and cheered.

"I want you to ask yourselves, were you in this campaign just for me? Or were you in it for that young Marine and others like it? Or were you in it for that mom struggling with cancer? Were you in it for that young boy and his mom surviving on the minimum wage? Were you in it for all the invisible people?" --- Personally I think this is the much needed line as it really asks if her followers if they were just voting for her or the issues. If it is the issues then vote Obama -- and if it was just for her then she believes in Obama so vote for Obama.

"By following the example of a brave New Yorker, a woman who risked her life to shepherd slaves along the Underground Railroad. On that path to freedom, Harriet Tubman had one piece of advice:

If you hear the dogs, keep going. If you see the torches in the woods, keep going. If they're shouting after you, keep going. Don't ever stop. Keep going. If you want a taste of freedom, keep going. And even in the darkest of moments, that is what Americans have done — we have found the faith to keep going.

I've seen it in you. I've seen it in our teachers and firefighters, nurses and police officers, small business owners and union workers, the men and women of our military you always keep going.

We are Americans. We're not big on quitting. But remember, before we can keep going, we've got to get going by electing Barack Obama the next president of the United States." -- This for me was another one of those Yes we can moments...where I felt like yes...lets not give up our freedom and lets not give up hope and keep fighting the good fight....and elect Obama.

"Nothing less than the fate of our nation and the future of our children hang in the balance. I want you to think about your children and grandchildren come Election Day. And think about the choices your parents and grandparents made that had such a big impact on your life and on the life of our nation. We've got to ensure that the choice we make in this election honors the sacrifices of all who came before us, and will fill the lives of our children with possibility and hope." -- And then this line I think rung true for me too...I do feel our fate as a nation hangs in the balance because we have had such a horrible 8 years and I just can't imagine another 4 of it with McCain. It make me feel so sad for us as nation.

I think she did a great job at doing what she needed to for this speech tonight. The energy was amazing and I look forward to roll call tomorrow as well as President Clinton's speech and Joe Biden's too. I suspect it will be an evening in front of the TV tomorrow night.


(Full transcript of speech)

Birthday Wishes

Wishing my beautiful sister a VERY Happy Birthday! Michael and I hope your day is filled with celebration of YOU! You are an amazing woman and I truly blessed to call you my sister! I love YOU!

Book Review: The Venetian's Wife

The Venetian's Wife: A Strangely Sensual Tale of a Renaissance Explorer, a Computer, and a Metamorphosis by Nick Bantock

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
The art and the words of this book are beautiful, sensual and captivating. I found myself drawn in - wondering where it would go and what image I would see when I turned the page. As always with Bantock - his collages just amaze and inspire me. It didn't get 5 stars because I didn't like how it ended. It wasn't a neat package that answered questions. Instead it left me with more questions then answers.




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Gratitude Friday

I am thankful for...
1. getting my cookbooks more organized so I can actually get at them easier
2. Brave the Rocks by Sabrina Ward Harrion -- amazing and inspiring
3. seeing sunrise over GJ - from the monument this past week
4. an idea to inexpensively replace all 42 cabinet/drawer handles in our kitchen and dining room
5. hopefully doing weeds for the last time of the summer

Time Lapse

A really good thing that happened this week....One of my very good friend Jessica has been wanting to take a trip so she called together a group of friends (A, C and I) and said lets all get together. So it looks like I am going to have a girls-weekend -- possibly the weekend of my birthday. Jessica is going to fly here and spend 1 or 2 days with Michael and I. And then her and I will drive to C's town since C can't get out of town - we will be having the weekend there. And then A will fly to C. After then Jessica and I will come back here and she will spend a couple days here before going home. So I am really excited about that. I could really use some girl time/friend time.

What else...

We have been up to the Colorado National Monument more lately then we probably went at all last year. Tuesday evening Michael wanted to film a sunset so we went up there to get that. And then Wednesday morning we got up at 4:15 so we could head up there again to film a sunrise. He is going use them as time lapse in a wedding video he is doing.

Tuesday evening before heading up to the Monument we stopped at the library so I could pick up a couple books on hold for me. One really just had me absorbed from the moment I picked it up -- Brave on the Rocks by Sabrina Ward Harrison. I haven't ever read/looked at her first book but of course now want it too. Brave on the Rocks really evoked my emotions, memories and imagination in positive ways. It is a book I would like to own as I am sure it would be a constant source of inspiration through her message and her art.

I finished Breaking Dawn in 2 nights. it is the forth book in the Twilight saga by Stephenie Meyers. I have some issues with Breaking Dawn But I think I will just do a review on good reads since it might have some spoilers. Right now I am reading The Post-Birthday World and I really thought after reading 21 pages that it would be one that ended up on the "didn't finish" list. I then got to a dialog instead of the authors long detailed explanations of things that don't have anything to do with the plot. And helped me plug on. But now is confusing me as the author described one scenario 2 ways. Two different ways it happened, two different sets of feelings and reactions. And the plot seems to go back and forth between the those two scenarios so I am not sure what actually happened. Where I ended off last night seems to have moved past that scenario but the book is still hanging in that....wonder if it will end up on the "didn't finish" list because it is annoying me.

I have been battling with a migraine this week. It started Tuesday evening and still hasn't really let up. I hope to at least get some work done today as I don't feel I have gotten much done this week.

I am thankful for...

1. Finishing Breaking Dawn
2. Making lasagna -- I hadn't made it in a long time. It tasted really good and also I froze half of it so we will get a couple meals from it during our busy September
3. Solutions to reorganize some cookbooks, things in the pantry and baking supplies
4. Being able to send out some mail love this week -- I like doing it and forget how fun it is when I haven't done it in a while.
5. Birthdays -- I have several friends celebrating this past week and in the coming week....I wish them all a very happy birthday!

I recognize that I have much more to be thankful for in my life

I had the dumb

Today we were out on the Colorado National Monument with the couple whose wedding we are filming. They are a lot of fun so there were many laughs. I still had a little lagging migraine so when we got home I pretty much went to bed. After I got up, I was going to attempt making dinner but thinking wasn't coming so Michael ordered us pizza. Thank goodness because when I came to look up if there were any coupons online - I had to put our zip code in and couldn't even remember it. I had to pull a bill from the stack I had sitting on my desk to input the correct zip code. So I fear what would have happened if I had tried to cook.

Sunny Saturday Out

Michael agreed to do a wedding video. The personal type videos aren't really his main area but he LOVES doing them for the very reason that they are personal -- about people. He likes capturing people. And he has a way that just seems to put everything together to create very beautiful and touching memory.

So today we met with the couple and went through some pictures with them and he asked them some questions to prep for filming them tomorrow. He is doing a pre-wedding interview for the video.

Because it has been raining every afternoon/evening -- we saw clouds forming over the Colorado National Monument -- where we were going to film. So that made us a little nervous that we might get rained out or that one of the areas we were filming would be too muddy to film (coincidentally the place is called Muddy Springs - and even after all the rain it wasn't Muddy). After meeting with the couple we went to check it out and it was fine. It was again nice just to kind of get out of town. I mean it wasn't far -- still in our area but up on the Monument and in Glade Park. But still incredibly beautiful. Always reminding me how lucky we are to live in Colorado.

Unfortunately by the time we got home I had a migraine. So had to take some meds and get into bed with an ice pack. I hope it clears up before tomorrow.

But over all it was a very nice day.


***image I did that was part of a book I made for Michael for Valentine's Day several years ago

Gratitude Friday

I am thankful for...
1. Girl Scout Thin Mint Blizzard we had yesterday for the Childrens Miracle Network at DQ. We only had 1 DQ participating and from what I heard they were giving not just profits from Blizzards but all profits that day to Children Miracle Network. And it was packed so I am believe they probably raised quite a bit for Children Miracle Network. Plus the girls in there were handling how packed they were -- very well.
2. A Very clean kitchen. I deep cleaned the kitchen today and it looks all sparkly. It felt good to get it done. Been so busy lately things just bare minuim so it was nice to get some real good cleaning done.
3. Impactful Paulo Coehlo book. It was really instersting and impactful.
4. Chatting with a good friend. We hadn't spoke in a while so it was good to chatch up with her.
5. Summer storms - although it was loud and made the lights flicker -- it was a really good rain. And we can always use that kind of moisture. But crossing fingers it doesn't interfer with our plans tomorrow.


(photo Michael took in a storm in 2003 - let me tell you how fun it is to sit in the car while he is standing outside with his camera - we are far away that there is no rain because water and camera not a good mix but you still have the crackling ligtening going off all around. Not fun!)