2018 in 2018

I reviewed 2,018 books

In 2018.

The King of Attolia

Although I’ll listen to it over the next day or two,

I spent a few precious free time hours

To enjoy reading it first.

Introspection

Though it’s the last Sunday of the year, 

I spent only perhaps 30 minutes on introspection.

I accomplished a lot of my goals this year,

But didn’t do much relationally. 

I don’t really want to think about this all.

The Queen of Attolia

So good that I read the ending on Friday night,

Stayed up to 1am Saturday night to hear the ending,

Then read it again. 

Two Kings

Hezekiah said, “Ah, well. Let the destruction come.

It won’t be in my lifetime.”

Jesus said, “Let the destruction fall on me.”

Diamond Art

In his stocking, Isaiah got a craft project:

Sticking hundreds of tiny bits of bling onto a prepared sheet. 

The end result was far cooler than I would have expected.

Space Activity Book

While the older boys watched three or four episodes 

Of Parks and Rec, I reviewed books. 

I found an activity book that, on first sight seemed dreadful,

But then I noticed: stickers! Mazes! 

So Caleb spent hour after hour with me, carefully coloring,

Stickering, writing. 

Goals

I realized a few days ago that I had reviewed 1850 books this year.

Why not go for an even thousand?

Or for 2018 books in 2018?

So I’m working more hours than I’d, strictly speaking, prefer.

With three days left, I have 83 to go for 2018.

Eggnog

Since sugar is not usually a large part of my diet,

The bottle of eggnog the church-going boys and I shared

Was so thick and rich and sweet . . . it was almost too much.

So I gave the option to all: 

Drink it as is, or

Dilute as much as you’d like.

For myself, a 1:4 ratio of eggnog to milk seemed about right.

Reset

Caleb, teary, headed down 

To the trampoline with me,

Where we jumped for ten minutes

In the cool sunshine, until we were

Both giggly and cheery.

Christmas Day

It’s always a letdown,

But after 40 Christmases,

I recognize that the

Disheveled house

And the tired children,

Hyped up on too much sugar

And too many vague

But disappointed 

Hopes,

Cry.

That’s the right response

For disappointed hopes.

Christmas Eve

Relaxed present opening,

With plenty of time to play in between each round,

Or watch a movie

(Or three).

And if the gifts weren’t all we wanted,

There’s the stockings and a few more, ready.

Mind.Blown.

In N.T. Wright’s Paul: A Biography,

He off-hand mentions

The definition of love

For the early Christians:

“A shared family life with 

Obligation of mutual support.”

Love one another.

Jason Johnston

A camp friend from my youth

Friended me.

He has the nicest smile,

A sweet-looking wife.

I was so happy when 

I saw his face again.

My List for Christmas Break

Watch the best scenes in Pride and Prejudice

Look through The Art of Movement

Clean the house before opening presents

Read I Saw Three Ships

Finish lap books

Read additional books for fun

Spend time with the boys

Christmas Break

I’ve told myself for months that I would 

“Catch up” on homeopathy

Over the Christmas holiday.

But now that it’s here, 

All I want to do is 

Read fun books until 1am or later,

And hang out. 

I’m not sure if this is a lack of discipline

Or a healthy rest.

Breakthrough

“Mom, come!”

Joe, awed, pulled my arm.

Through the leafless branches,

The usually obscured neighbor’s house

Stood clear in the dawn light,

A fiery sword stood suspended above it,

Reminding me to be always on the lookout

For breakthroughs of glory,

And not immediately discover the prosaic explanation

Of a newly installed chimney shining in the sun.

I Saw Three Ships

“Gold, Frankincense, and Myrrh,” said Dorcas. “Their wealth, their prayer, their death. Three good gifts.”

My favorite Christmas story,

By Elizabeth Goudge,

Revisited every year.

A slim volume, just 60 pages,

But with resonance upon resonance,

Beauty upon beauty,

Until I find myself weeping with joy.

Pride and Prejudice

I had counted this a favorite.

And it’s a charming bit of fun.

But, having gone through all 

Jane Austen’s other five . . .

I think my favorite is Emma. 

Is it just that I prefer Mr. Knightley 

To Mr. Darcy?

I maybe even prefer Mansfield Park!

Would not have thought it possible a year ago.

Could this be maturity?

Best Day Ever

Besides a husband, down for the count,

And a lethargic son, throwing up,

And six hours without electricity,

I had such a lovely day.

I spent an hour finishing a hands-on project for school.

Will it make any difference in eternity?

None. But I bought it, and the boys worked on it.

So let me finish it.

I watched my favorite 25 minutes of Keira Knightley

In Pride and Prejudice. It’s a lovely movie . . .

But the book is better. 

I read and read and read to the boys. 

Picked up a record seven (!) packages at the post office.

Watched the boys open their matchbox cars from friends,

Then opened a box with three puzzles.

Isaiah took the 300 piece. Caleb and I did the two 60 piece.

We read by candlelight. 

Found enough food to satisfy ourselves during the power outage.

Cleaned the house a bit.

Tried two sudoku puzzles (both failed, but it’s okay).

Prayed.

Sank deep into the day off.

Full Body Hives

My precious husband. 

Eyes swollen shut

To the point of 

Unrecognizibility.

Itchy rash spreading.

At last he sought the 

Solace of Benadryl:

Not a drug-free family.

Solstice

It gets darker and darker,

And then Jesus is born.

This Wendell Berry 

Went off to a friend,

As a poem a day has gone

Day after day

Since I heard of his 

Separation, divorce.

And it gave an excuse for

A dialogue about grief.

A gift to me

On this shortest day of the year.

Spy School

A six-month advance reader’s copy came

Of the seventh in the Spy School series.

I put work aside and stayed up until 1am.

Everyone can use a guilty pleasure on occasion.

Life Goals

Finished the sixth and final

Annotated Jane Austen novel.

Two amazing:

Pride and Prejudice

Emma

Two enjoyable:

Persuasion

Mansfield Park

Two not my favorite:

Northanger Abbey (satiric puff piece)

Sense and Sensibility (so acid)

Glad of it all.

Flavor Palette

Uninspired for dinner,

I realized what I want is Mediterranean.

As the boys went to Costco for hotdogs,

I enjoyed Greek chicken wraps at home.

Help

Setting up the online integrations

Was more than I could manage.

All morning, my brother would call,

As I read schoolbooks with my sons.

Alarm Clock

Caleb, bored within twenty minutes of waking,

Headed to the bedroom to 

Shake and wake

Abraham and Joe.

We Laughed and Laughed

Phil discovered the water jar empty

Again.

In a teasing mood, he berated the boys,

“Fill up the water purifier!”

There may have been the name

Squash-head thrown around.

Joe could hardly stand upright,

He was laughing so hard.

So Phil sat on him.

Joe laughed harder, then said:

“Help, help! I’m being oppressed!”

And we replied: “See the violence inherent in the system!”

World War I

Director Peter Jackson

Took 100 hours of footage from WWI,

Cleaned it, colored it, edited it

So, for two and a half hours

You can watch the training,

The bad teeth,

The effects of mustard gas,

The artillery explosions,

The horses

And the tanks.

I cried my way through the trailer.

I honor those of the Great War,

But I’m not sure I want to relive it.

Slow Motion

Slow motion video captured

The flexible back,

The tire-tread firm feet,

The stationary head and neck,

The counter-balance tail,

The focused eyes,

The lithe grace

Of the running cheetah.

We Laughed Till We Cried

Caleb, on stage for the Christmas cantata,

Pulled his arms out of his sleeves.

We feared he would go bare-chested.

He picked his nose. 

He shrugged off the elbow of the little boy next to him.

As dozens of well-behaved children sang their hearts out,

There was Caleb, distracting, and . . .

The star of the show.

Was It the Remedy?

I spent a frustrating hour or two,

Trying to take care of the website setup.

And with six more hours of work looming,

And more senses of failure than I could handle,

I lost it on Phil. Sobbed.

He told me to take the day off.

No more work.

So I slept and read to Caleb and read a book

And made spaghetti.

And when my sister called to show me the reader covers,

They turned out so beautifully,

And my afternoon had been so lovely, my whole day turned around.

But was my response from proving the remedy,

Or from a long period of legitimate stress?

Trademark Attorney

I called a lawyer today. 

Haven’t done that before. 

She was kind and encouraging.

Maybe the product will be

HappyCheetah, not

Flowstone.

Ready for Christmas

When it came time to do schoolwork,

Instead I walked into the playroom and 

Started discarding possessions.

We need space for new stuff!

Coaching Call

Delayed one month out of the three,

With internet so slow as to be unmanageable . . .

I survived my third coaching call . . .

But it feels like just barely.

Relief

After a month of production,

I need to switch back to marketing.

Thankfully, my coaching calls are recorded.

I had forgotten much, and needed to watch again.

Remembered

A few more weeks of work

Before we move forward

With the next Sonlight program.

Both sons busied their hands,

And I suddenly remembered:

We have an unopened lap book to do.

Time to start cutting and coloring!

Pants

Caleb came out of the bathroom,

And Abraham could hardly speak.

Little pockets in the front,

Zipper at the back.

I soon got him straightened out.

Failure

I have started to remember my dreams.

I have some measure of failure in every one.

Hopes: Crushed

So many words to inspire;

So many names to hope.

Fail, fail, fail.

Finding a brandname

Has spoiled more than 

Two months of my life.

Three

Decked in winter clothes,

The three youngest,

Intrepid explorers,

Set off into the 

Accumulated inches.

The three bobbing heads,

Jackets brown, brown, blue,

Heading downhill,

Sticking to each other’s footprints,

All in a row.

Snow

A legitimate, all day snow

Falls so rarely, 

We skipped church to hunker down.

Piles

One of the best things about late Saturday afternoon,

Once paid work is done for the week, 

Is to turn my attention to the piles on the counter,

Gradually accumulated over the days past.

Not one of the items takes much time,

But altogether they require a few hours:

This receipt, that stack of books, this manual,

Those catalogs, these magazine pages.

And then I can go to bed, all items dispersed,

A clean counter my reward for my efforts.

Christmas Party

I am always so honored to be invited,

And this party, with my two oldest boys,

Was a joy from beginning to end.

Hot cider, Isaiah’s cookies, and peppermint meringues;

Conversation in depth with friends I rarely greet;

The general hubbub of cheerful, happy people;

Christmas lights and Christmas dresses;

A gaudy suit that lit up like a Christmas tree . . .

It was a party to treasure.

Weary

After an emotionally trying day,

I took a bath and went to bed 

Just after nine.

Slept the whole night through, too!

Tears

Caleb has been willful during school,

But when the time came to sleep,

He wept that he hadn’t read.

So I got him up, and he read

On and on, beautifully.

Certified Homeopath

I went to a partially deaf homeopath,

A kind man with a booming voice—

Shockingly deep and resonant.

He has studied with Vithoulkas

(Even edited some of his books!).

Such a privilege, to have such care.

One Remedy

When a friend freaked out if anything was out of place,

I found the rubric

“Mind, anger, objects not in their proper place.”

Only one rubric there,

And it made total sense, in context.

Take the Nux vomica!

Radical Medicine

The first time I started this book,

I didn’t finish before I joined a homeopathy school.

But then I was pregnant, and diffuse.

Returning again, I am astonished at the realism:

Iatrogenic disease may be the number one killer.

But holistic methods of the past aren’t enough.

(With pollutions internal and external,

Water therapy and good food do not help.)

We need something to go to the root.

The author recommends: 

Plant stem cells to clear the way.

Sankaran homeopathy.

Exciting stuff!

Eric Liddell

A sermon on rest, 

Something lately lacking in me.

Eric Liddell ran,

Not to prove himself,

But “God made me fast.

And when I run, I feel his pleasure.”

Do I feel that way 

When I practice homeopathy?

I do.

Then I must carry on.

Waking Up Late

To get to church on time,

I had to wake Caleb,

Soft-cheeked and warm

With sleep. 

He wasn’t happy to have me 

Cuddle him,

But I managed a bit

Just the same.

Cheating

Though Caleb and I usually content ourselves

With 100-piece puzzles,

This time we did a 270,

With only part of the picture revealed.

I looked at the box as much as possible,

To try to place specific pieces.

It took an hour and a half,

And Caleb said, in the end,

“We cheated.”

Bible Study

I hadn’t gone in months,

But I took the hours to 

Study Jonah,

Taught by my husband.

A bit of a painful start,

But good discussion,

And a good time had by all.

I think I needed to leave the house.

Screamingly Funny

Overall, I have found

Sense and Sensibility

As acid a work as I might

Ever suffer to read.

Then Mrs. Jennings

Misunderstood Elinor,

Who, distracted, didn’t pursue

The slight oddities of response,

Creating an extended scene

So screamingly funny

I had to lean on the counter

Until my mirth was exhausted.

Memories

How interesting, to revisit a book

I’d forgotten I’d ever visited.

Return to Gone-Away.

A family buys a ruined wreck 

Of a magnificent home,

And happen across some

Chippendale furniture in the attic

That will pay for all their improvements. 

I think I’ve always had this idea

At the back of my mind

That such things could be . . .

It must have been a seed planted,

Too many years ago to remember.

Interesting

The traumas in my life have been minor,

So even to write about them makes me feel 

Like Marianne Dashwood, ever making 

Much over little, or nothing.

But a theme emerged:

All my traumas relate to something I failed to do, 

Whether from ignorance, or distraction.

I had thought my perfectionism was gone . . .

But I don’t think it has.

Certified Homeopath

I haven’t been to a homeopath

Since 2013.

I filled out the narrative 

For Dr. Guess.

He asked for 6-7 pages.

I gave him 25. 

I feel horrible . . .

But I’m not sure what I could have left out.

Still Fall

Though most trees stand bare,

We paused our reading as the clearing

Filled with leaves, 

Falling, rising, floating.

Mental Health Hour

Just Jadon and I went up to church.

So overstimulated—bad dream,

Emotional upheaval of weeks past,

Sick husband, loud boys—

I sang, dispiritedly, 

And then went out to sit in the car 

For the sermon. 

I needed silent prayer.

Regrouping. 

Personal analysis.

Then I was better,

And spent a lovely half hour or so

In conversation.

I Could Have

If there had been pressing tasks,

I could have worked.

But there weren’t, 

So I spent the day on homeopathy,

Thankful for a day to spend.

Photo Books

I spent four hours or so,

Going through old photos:

Printing photo books,

Moving photos to the hard drive,

Saving, editing, deleting.

It was not my favorite way 

To spend time, 

But I am pleased to have

More computer storage space,

And a long looming task 

Completed.

Thanksgiving, Round Eight

I left our eighth Thanksgiving

At the DeLaura’s

Feeling 

Euphoric.

Good conversation, 

Laughter,

New friend,

Old.

Photography

A friend asked if I would take photos

Of her family.

I said yes.

I didn’t (necessarily) want to.

But a new birth announced,

A surprisingly short disruption to my day,

Easy lighting . . .

It was a good half hour.

On to editing!

One Son Is My Cook

We had a meal in mind, 

But when 7:30 rolled around

I realized I was in need of a break

And he would arrive home from judo

Hungry.

So I made dinner.

All were very grateful.

Tacos

With limited time and hungry stomachs,

I taught Isaiah to make tacos.

The beans I had made before I left

Had, apparently, sat on the counter for days.

They were spoiled.

But those who were hungry ate,

And Isaiah was suitably praised.

Unexpected

My niece was sick again.

Has been sick for months now,

Ever since the family failed to adopt.

I asked her questions for almost an hour,

The looked up her most unusual symptoms.

The remedy was one I would never expect,

More useful for arthritis and poison ivy.

But the report the next day:

Cheerful, no more pain.

Entire transformation.

A New Day

Phil offered a boy

Ten dollars a day

To clean the kitchen

To make the food.

One is doing each.

I am teaching.

One day soon I’ll do neither.

Buying back hours each day.

Mood Pencil

Caleb has had a wee attitude issue.

Back-to-back travel has left him distressed.

He wasn’t much interested in reading

(At least: not my way).

Then Joe noticed that some of our pencils

Change with the temperature.

Mood pencils?

Let’s do more schoolwork, please!

Sleep

I think I dozed off, briefly, 

In the car as we came home from church.

I remember my hands twitching, then no more.

Two hours then I slept and dozed,

A luxury of the Sabbath.

Change of Plans

I had expected to study homeopathy,

But with production turnaround looming,

I worked instead.

Slept.

Read to Caleb.

He was needing some attention.

Delivery

I don’t know what happened in town,

But I’ve never seen a traffic jam

In Charlottesville like that.

A trip that should have taken less than two hours

Stretched on another hour,

Ever so stressful.

Left me shaky and exhausted.

But it was fun to have Caleb with me

As I brought back the rental car!

Thankful

I was going through airport security

When I learned that my flight

From Charlotte to Charlottesville

Was cancelled.

I was rerouted for a flight two days later.

Yeah, that’s not good enough.

So I sat in the airport and rented a car,

And gratefully drove the four hours.

I was home when Caleb woke just after 2am.

Redirect

I had a plan for the day.

The night before, 

Based on new information,

I changed plans entirely.

So we had a productive day,

Just not quite what I expected.