This picture could’ve been more artfully rendered, but despite that, I love looking at it.
Green.
Some days I just need that shade of green.
What colors are capturing your attention today?
For the past few weeks/months I’ve been eking away at some projects, step by-step:
–creating an exercise habit. I’ve been working out 6 days/week since early September. It’s not always easy to fit in and I don’t always enjoy the effort, but I love how important it’s become in my life and how good I’m feeling these days.
–reconnecting with an old favorite activity, canoeing, as I learn how how to paddle outrigger-style. A friend’s been taking me out on the Back Bay periodically through the holidays and I’ve decided to join a team so I can train more intensely and race. I can’t believe that I’m nearly 40 and I’ve just joined up with a new team sport. It’s amazing the places this journey of my life takes me.
–getting a spiffy new c-leg because mine’s an old out-of-warranty model. I had various fittings over the past 2 months and if all goes well I’ll have it in hand (or rather, on foot) Friday morning. This one will have a remote control. I kid you not. And no way am I telling my teenage kids where I’m hiding that little gizmo (no replay of “The Wrong Trousers” happening around here, I say)
–working diligently on my academic projects, including the first final draft of the diphtheria chapter for my dissertation. It’s a love/hate thing: love the process of history-making, hate that my intentions are always loftier than what emerges on the page. I love/hate diphtheria, too–love learning about the disease (fascinating stuff, that), hate the sorrow and horror of lives lost to it.
–finding novels again. For awhile I’d given them up, having grown weary of reading (not an unimaginable thing when you realize that I digest 4-10 books/week for my “work”). While in NYC I discovered books all over again. The joy! I’ve been coming home with a stack of novels from the library each week and am simply devouring them. I allow myself to read in that space of time after the daily work is done and I’m not quite yet ready for sleep. I just finished _The Blind Assassin_ and started _Arrowsmith_ last night.
How about you, what steps have you been taking lately?