Myrna CG Mibus - Idyllwild

Bit by bit, I'm getting my new office organized. It's a slow process but I'm making progress. Tonight I got my memoir collection on the shelves organized by author. I know I have more books floating around the house to fit in here and I still have space for them. That is good. I'm thinking I will put my writing books on the bottom shelf of my bookshelf. I expect the bookshelf will be full very soon.  Memoir collection - or most of it. I'm sure there's more floating around the house. Also in progress is bookshelf organization in the rest of the house. Our fiction, science fiction and non-fiction, poetry and drama collections are going on shelves in the upstairs hallway. The aviation and religion books are going on shelves downstairs. There are books on other shelves in the house, too, that feel like they need their own space: horse books, Border Terrier books, James Herriot books, Harry Potter books, the Guardians of Ga'hoole collection, Laura...

I’m at a writing retreat with two of my writing friends, Joy and Chris. Soon after settled in our retreat space, the lovely Anderson Center in Red Wing, Minnesota, Chris and Joy got right to work on their projects. If we had a retreat leader (we don’t, this is a self-led retreat), the leader would say that Chris and Joy are ideal retreat goers - hardworking, industrious, focused. If said teacher handed out grades Chris and Joy would get an A. Anderson Center picture compliments of The Anderson Center, www.andersoncenter.org I, on the other hand, would only get a B. But the B wouldn’t be for my writing. It would be for Tea Kettle Cleaning. Because this is what happened to me when I settled into my room to write last night. I looked over three essays I started a while back and concluded that they are not worth editing or even looking at ever again. But then I realized that I haven’t written anything other than blog entries and content for a website project in about six...

I just started reading a book, Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach . The book was recommended to me and I like it so far.  In case you don't already know, I have a hard time liking myself sometimes. Okay, lots of times. At this moment I'm not going to get into the "why" I struggle with with liking myself or anything like that. It's simply a statement of fact - I struggle with liking me. I'm working on it. And I'm making progress. I have several close friends who know that I struggle with this liking me thing. One is my friend, writer and blogger, Joy (check out her blog - My Musical Family ) And this morning Joy emailed me a link to a blog, " The Extraordinary Ordinary " written by a blogger named Heather. Joy saw her entry from yesterday, " Focus ," and liked it, she said, and thought I might, too. I wonder if she saw the Focus entry and thought of me because my Facebook status update yesterday was " focusfocusfocusfocus ...

It's  a lovely spring day here in Minnesota and I really want to be outside reading a book or riding my bike or something fun like that. Instead, I have work to prepare for my Memoir: Writing of Family class so I'm in my office with the windows open getting ready to get to work. First, though, I'm allowing myself a chance to do some fun work. I've decided to write a quick blog entry which will help get my head in the right place for the writing I need to do for class. At least that's my rationale. I reality I suppose I'm goofing off and avoiding my class writing. Oh well. Last night we took our bikes to Valley Bike and Ski for a few adjustments. Owen's seat was too low and I've been feeling like I'm putting too much weight on my arms when I ride. Dan, one of the guys at Valley, took care of our adjustments while Jerrod, another guy who works there, answered Ryan's questions about shifting gears. Rose announced that she wants a road bike so she...

We'll I'm back home now and had a great time celebrating my birthday yesterday. I had my memoir class at The Loft in the morning then went out to Perkins for a Birthday dinner with my family last night. It was a great day, the kind where I remember how much friends and family mean to me, how much I enjoy relatively simple things like good conversations with family members and friends. The final fun part of my birthday was a trip to Valley Bike and Ski where I finally picked out my cycling shoes and Owen picked out some cool weather cycling gear. Our bikes are there in the shop all put together and ready for us to take home. My plan is to head back to the shop tonight and have the guys check me out on how to clip in and out of my pedals. Then, thoroughly checked out, I'm planning to load the bikes up and bring them home. That means I'm going to be cycling soon, maybe even tomorrow. Our plan is to ride the 30 mile Iron Man at the end of April. I have some cycling to d...