Dear Jasmina » Reading

Reading

Jacinta — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 12:00:18 +0000

My head is in “The Stone Angel” by Margaret Laurence, racing through pages between the moments when Marie-Hélène is awake. I sit on the couch in front of the tv – tuned to some musical channel – while Christian burrows through piles of elementary projects. Occasionally, I’ll read him a sentence or two. “The poplar bluffs had budded with sticky leaves, and the frogs had come back to the sloughs and sang like choruses of angels with sore throats, and the marsh marigolds were opening like shavings of sun on the brown river where the tadpoles danced and the bloodsuckers lay slimy and low, waiting for the boys’ feet.” It made me laugh – the angels with sore throats. Christian said he could hear them.

Reading

Jacinta — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 12:00:49 +0000

A novel. I indulged for the holidays. They’re over. Back to non-fiction.

Does it ever give thee pause, that men used to have a soul – not by hearsay alone, or as a figure of speech; but as a truth that they knew, and acted upon! Verily it was another world then… but yet it is a pity we have lost the tidings of our souls… we shall have to go in search of them again, or worse in all ways shall befall us. (Past and Present by Thomas Carlyle)

Holidays

Jacinta — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 20:48:12 +0000

We’ve been to Saskatoon and back, for Christmas, for my birthday, for Marie-Hélène’s grandparents… It takes eight hours of driving. And to our surprise, Marie-Hélène was really good.

The roads were bad a good quarter of the way to Saskatoon, which stretched the time to ten hours.

I read a good book with bite-sized chapters, and now spout nutritional facts to anyone who listens.

And it was my birthday. And of all the candles shaped into a 26…

I missed three…

Reading

Jacinta — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 12:00:23 +0000

For the up-to-date: Time Magazine’s Top 10 Everything of 2009
For the romantic: Pioneer Woman’s Love Story
For inspiration: Stephanie Nielson’s Story

For the student who cannot procrastinate her anthropology studying any longer: Understanding Physical Anthropology and Archeology. Exam is on Friday. Wish me luck!

Reading

Jacinta — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:00:50 +0000

Lonny is where I spent time while installers were putting in our new windows upstairs. An online magazine? Yes, and it’s perfect… interesting and clutter-free!

Reading

Jacinta — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:00:47 +0000

Sometimes getting out the door feels like trying to grab a fish, where time is the water and the fish is the opportunity. One night, I was exasperated. I’m more or less surrounded by books, most I’ve read, others are for emergency situations and still others are on the “must read becasue I must” list – like the gift from Dr Doyle. From Ste. Anne, an hour’s drive from Winnipeg, he is an entrepreneurial-pioneer and has self-published a number of books on medicine, faith and love. I only read A Love Story – essentially a compilation of letters and notes between his wife and him. By the end of the book, his wife dies of cancer, and I had thoroughly soaked my pillow in tears, reading it at night beside Christian. I loved the simple narrative so much, I sent him a thank-you note, as he lives in the same condo building as Christian’s parents. For Christmas, he sent me his latest publication: The Path to Heaven – A Christian Perspective. My pillow remains quite dry, and I figured I needed just a little more drama, so I begged John to lend me a book from his collection… something without quantum physics. I’m now chapters deep in beautiful Africa, but afraid of the inevitable bloodshed of Shake Hands With the Devil. See Pa! There’s devil in the title, but it’s a good book!

Short story

Jacinta — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 12:00:21 +0000

A man shuffles by. I notice that he’s hunched and wears a dirty navy overcoat. He’s unshaven and clutches a newspaper folded in two. I hardly notice him except for the distinct smell of sweat and smoke as I type a subject into the computer’s database search engine. He is the kind of person easy to find in the downtown library. I imagine them shabby savants. But I’m here for the books… I love the feeling of being surrounded by books, and I’ll go just for the possibility of having to choose something from so many books. And coming home with a small stack of books is the best feeling in the world. Yes, I am a nerd, but until I have 4 children, I’m holding on to that nerdiness just awhile longer.

Reading

Jacinta — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 12:00:07 +0000

New York Times article entitled: Modern Love

Reading

Jacinta — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:00:45 +0000

The Four Agreements – a self-help book I purposefully tell John about just to see his face say “lame”. Because John reads books like Broca’s Brain which require a general knowledge of quantum physics. And the closest I get to quantum physics is The Big Bang Theory on tv.