Let's Bust a Recap : Tuesdays with Morrie

I should have gotten this post up last week, but sometimes blogging is just a drag, y'all. Reading Tuesdays with Morrie, however, was anything but a drag. 

This sweet little memoir was first published in 1997 and since that time has been translated into 31 languages in 36 countries. I'd call that a hit. The writer, Mitch Albom, has not only authored several popular books, he is a top sports columnist, ESPN sports panelist and commentator, and radio host. I'm not sure if he ever sleeps.

In Tuesdays with Morrie, Albom recounts the time and conversations he had with his 78 year old college sociology professor, Morrie Schwartz, leading up to his death from ALS. In their Tuesday meetings, they dealt with such topics as Death, Fear, Aging, Greed, Marriage, Family, Society, and Forgiveness. 

While there was a lot of wisdom in this book and some valuable life lessons, it fell flat for me because the most important issues of life and death—God's relationship to man, Heaven, Hell—were skirted around and dealt with in an abstract and philosophical rather than concrete and practical way. This book ultimately left me feeling so sad because this man I'd come to know and love through its pages came to the end of his life grasping at a lot of beautiful philosophies but—if Tuesdays with Morrie is true—ignorant of the Truth. According to Albom in Tuesdays with Morrie, Morrie Schwartz was a "religious mutt" borrowing feely from all religions. Though he determined to meet death with dignity after he was diagnosed with ALS, when he closed his eyes for the last time,  what did he meet? 

I loved this book. I want to spend the last days of my life with dignity, loving my people and laughing a lot. I want to be brave like Morrie. 

But let me be perfectly clear: there is only one Truth and His name is Jesus. He is the only Door to Heaven, and the people who choose not to surrender to Him before death will be eternally separated from Him in a place of eternal torment called Hell. I know that's offensive and alienating and extremely unpopular. Many would call me hateful and narrow-minded for these beliefs. But the most loving thing I know to do is tell the truth. And that's it.

I would recommend Tuesdays with Morrie, but there's a more important Book that has all the answers Morrie didn't. Read that one first. And if you don't have one, please feel free to contact me for a copy. I will put it in the mail today.

Have you read Tuesdays with Morrie? What was one of your favorite lessons from Morrie?

The Entertainer Book Tag

Last week, Sabrina from Tired Mom Reading tagged me to answer some fun bookish questions. So here I am not procrastinating at all and answering them within a week of reading her post. Yay me! 

Six Questions from Sabrina

1. What is your favorite book-to-movie adaption? Least favorite?

Oh boy. Thanks for starting with such an easy question, Sabrina. All the movies just popped into my head. Okay, for favorites I think I'll go with The Help or A Walk to Remember. (We weren't supposed to pick just one, were we??) 

For least favorites, the first trainwreck that popped into my mind is Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story, but I can't even count that because adaptation of WHAT? Not any Anne book I've ever read. Ugh. So officially I'll go with The Hobbit trilogy. I thought the first movie was pretty good, but the second one was so abysmal I didn't even bother watching the third one. 

2. You're hosting a dinner for your three favorite heroes/heroines. Who will be there, what will you talk about, and does everyone leave alive?

Christy (Miller) Spencer, Katie (Weldon) Lorenzo, and Sierra (Jensen) Bryce obviously. We will talk about literally everything under the sun, and we will particularly encourage each other in our roles as wives. Of course we will all leave alive with our next Girls Night Out already on the calendar.

*These are all characters written by Robin Jones Gunn for anyone this reference is lost on.*

3. What is a book you would recommend to everyone and why?

The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom because not only is it full of beautiful truth, suspense,  and adventure, it's all true and the events in the book happened during such an important time in world history that we ought never forget about. And BONUS along the same lines, I'd also recommend Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand to anyone. Both are excellent.

4. Who are your fictional book crushes?

Gilbert Blythe, Todd Spencer, and Mr. Knightley are probably my top three. Need I elaborate? I think not.

5. What book series do you wish there was more of? How about less of?

This is another tough one. I wish the Anne of Green Gables books could just keep going forever and ever, generation after generation. I'd also love some more Little Women in my life. 

The "less of" is a little harder. Do we have to have read the books to know we want less? I can honestly say I wish the Twilight and 50 Shades books never existed, but I haven't actually read them.

6. Where is your favorite place to get books?

I love to find little hole-in-the-wall used bookstores. My all-time favorite was Booktraders in downtown Winter Haven, but sadly, it closed. My current local favorite is The Book Shelter in Lake Wales. I hope they stick around. 

Thanks so much for tagging me, Sabrina! I'll tag Lyndsey @ The Bolden Journey, Caroline @ Big World :: Small Girl, Christina @ Remember to be Tandy, Alison @ The Juggling Act, and Jen @ "Just a Mom's" View. My six questions for y'all are:

1. Do you re-read books? What was the last book you re-read?

2. What book are you most proud of finishing?

3. What are some of your hobbies aside from reading?

4. What is your favorite read (so far) of 2018? Least favorite?

5. Bookmarks or dog-ears?

6. Who are your read-everything-they-ever-wrote favorite authors?

Full disclosure: I totally cherrypicked these questions from other Entertainer Book Tag posts I ended up reading when I fell down the blog hole after Sabrina tagged me. 

If I didn't tag you, but you decide to do this on your blog, please come back and leave the link to your post so I can read your answers, and if you don't have a blog, feel free to answer any or all of these questions down in the comments and we can talk all things bookish!

Casual Fridays

Y'all. Casual Fridays have just died over here. Forget about it. So much time has passed. Where do we even start? I'll tell you where:

07/04/18

Because freedom and true love and the freaking 'stache. We spent our 4th of July eating way too much food and admiring Cody's magnificent facial hair. RIP The Mustache of 2018. Also, we played Euchre. Because I finally gave in and learned to play and now I'm addicted and can't stop. If you know this game, come play with me. 

Now for a proper bookish start to this post:

Here are some of the gems I've picked up at The Book Shelter lately. I think I've had pretty good self-control (considering the first time we went, I ended up with 14 books), but Cody's still a little fearful whenever I announce I'm heading for The Book Shelter. I've been back twice since that fateful anniversary trip, and along with all these fantastic books (including that Beth Moore Esther workbook which had nary a mark in it) I also scored the entire series of Parks & Rec on DVD. Because not only do they sell books, they sell board games and movies and video games—oh my! Have you read any of these? If I had to choose between Their Eyes Were Watching God, Rebecca, The Language of Flowers, or The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society for my 2019 book list, which one should make the cut? ("All of them" is an entirely acceptable answer.)

I'd probably be going to The Book Shelter a lot more frequently if I wasn't running off to the beach every spare day I get. Most of my trips have been solo, but I did manage to drag my BFF with me one day, and we ended up witnessing a totally casual wedding. (#memories) When we noticed they didn't have anyone to take a picture of the whole group, I sashayed my little bikini-clad body over to offer up my services as an impromptu photographer, much to the chagrin delight of my best friend. The family was very appreciative even though Christina wanted to melt into the sand. As you can see, my toenails haven't been entirely neglected this summer. That purple home pedi was flawless, but the beachy coral pedi was smudge city which has brought me to a new conclusion about smudgy pedicures: the nail polish brand matters. Anyone else find this to be true? 

I alluded to this in my God Is Able recap, but I didn't mention that my husband totally surprised me with these fun summery porch furniture cushions and they are making me so happy. Our porch chairs have been cushion-less since Irma, and I've been loving being able to (comfortably) spend more time outside this summer. 

06/04/18

I set a new world record Yahtzee score. (Ignore all of our confused faces, I was trying to figure out how to do a screenshot. #technicaldifficulties) But really though. 620??? That has to be a world record, right? Right?!

07/15/18

And speaking of my fellow Yahtzee Nazis (I just came up with that. Can I trademark it? Or is it offensive?), I squeezed in the quickest weekend roadtrip to see some of my favorite people recently. They're just extremely lucky I didn't smuggle my nephew home with me. Serious tears when I had to drive away from that baby. They're moving to Germany and even though they're really psyched about it, I'm still hitting my knees every morning asking God to make the Army change its mind. #sorrynotsorry Check Little Miss Thing eyeing her daddy like, "Gosh, you're so embarrassing, Dad!"

07/26/18

I got a few sweet hours with my other favorites yesterday. Thing 1 and Thing 2 are getting real good at faces-on-command. I treasure every second with these precious girls, and I hope they always love coming to Auntie Hannah's house. 

The puppies are doing good. Although between the two of them, I've cleaned up more puke this week than I would have preferred. Colonel likes to eat baby wipes so all trash cans have long been placed out of reach of either mangy mutt, but this week he managed to snitch two wipes that were literally sitting right next to me while I was changing a diaper and naturally they came back up a couple days later because baby wipes are not digestible, y'all. Don't eat them. Major regurgitated his breakfast Wednesday for no apparent reason. Perhaps he felt left out? The world may never know, and I am so over it.

Last summer around this time, I started a segment on the blog entitled "Adventures in Coloring" because my husband got me this insane grown-up coloring book. In the entire year since then, I have managed to complete two more pages. Two. And recently started a third. I'm obviously slaying. My hubby thinks the fish lips page doesn't even look finished because of how much I left white, but look at those teeny tiny scales, y'all! Haven't I done enough?!

I let some random stranger at a Fantastic Sam's hack up my hair a couple weeks ago because I was so bored with it, but, as is usually the case, I was immediately remorseful. It's hair. It grows. Whatever.

And if you've actually made it to the end of this post, I have a serious question for you. I have Mere Christianity and Othello lined up for my August reading, but I can't decide on which novel I'd like to tackle next. Should August include The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, Hinds' Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard, or Song of Deborah by Bette M. Ross? Help!

Did you make it this far? How's your summer been? To sum up: nail polish brand recommendations, 2019 book list choices, Yahtzee props, coloring encouragement, August novel vote. Annnnnd GO.

A Word for Wednesday

"I don't like reading about martyrs because they always make me feel petty and ashamed...

ashamed to admit I hate to get out of bed on frosty mornings and shrink from a visit to the dentist!"

~from Anne of Windy Poplars by L.M. Montgomery~

A Word for Wednesday

"Whether or not God CHOOSES to do something is a question of His sovereignty, not His ability.

Whether or not He WILL do it is His business.

But believing that he CAN—that's our business."

~Priscilla Shirer~

Let's Bust a Recap : The Good Earth

Okay, for some reason, I'm having a really hard time with this recap and I'm not sure why. I loved The Good Earth. It's probably the best novel I will read this year. (That is, if we're not counting my re-reads because nothing will ever touch Anne Shirley, y'all.)

The Good Earth was written by Pearl S. Buck in 1929, first published in 1931, and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1932. Buck later went on to become the first American woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1938. Though Buck was born in West Virginia to American parents, she was raised and lived mainly in China from the tender age of 5 months old until her early 40s. Personally, I think that qualifies her to write about China though she has often been criticized for The Good Earth by many Americans who claim it is a collection of racist stereotypes. I would argue that Buck's life proves the point that she was anything but racist what with all her advocacy for minority groups and her humanitarian work.

In The Good Earth, we follow the life of a peasant Chinese farmer, Wang Lung, from the day of his wedding to a slave woman named O-Lan to the end of his life. The Good Earth is beautiful, tragic, poignant, lyrical, and full of wisdom. All throughout my reading of The Good Earth, I couldn't help but compare it to many Biblical stories. Wang Lung reminded me so much of King David and much of the novel read like a New Testament parable.

There were many times while reading this book that I felt so frustrated with Wang Lung, but for the most part I was just captivated by this truly beautiful portrayal of life. I started this book at the end of June thinking it would kind of transition me into my July reading, but once I began I couldn't put it down and ended up finishing it in June.

I would definitely recommend it. And since I'm still having trouble stringing my thoughts into a cogent blog post, here's another photo of my copy of this novel with my Japanese tea set (which seems wrong seeing as how Chinese/Japanese relations have always been tense at best). I will most certainly be revisiting The Good Earth in the future.

Have you ever read The Good Earth or anything else steeped in Eastern culture? Did you love it as much as I did? 

A Word for Wednesday

"Novelists should never allow themselves to weary of the study of real life. 

If they observed this duty conscientiously, 

they would give us fewer pictures chequered with vivid contrasts of light and shade; 

they would seldom elevate their heroes and heroines to the heights of rapture—

still seldomer sink them to the depths of despair; 

for if we rarely taste the fullness of joy in this life, 

we yet more rarely savour the acrid bitterness of hopeless anguish..."

~from The Professor by Charlotte Brontë~

Let's Bust a Recap : God Is Able

Not to start out with too much silliness, but that photo is real, y'all. That's my book on my happy summer chair cushions. Is it just me or does it look like some fake stock photo I stole from the internet? No? I'm ridiculous? Fine. On to the recap.

God Is Able was originally published in 2013 and is by one of my favorite Bible teachers, Priscilla Shirer. In this excellent book, Priscilla breaks down two of the most extravagant verses in the Bible: Ephesians 3:20-21.

"Now to Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen."

With an introduction, seven distinct chapters each dealing with a word or phrase from the verses, a conclusion, and weighing in at a mere 157 pages, this book is simple and wouldn't take very long to read. I deliberately made myself slow down with this one, reading it more like a devotional than just another quick book to check off my list.

The thing I most appreciated about this book is how she really broke down the verses into those seven sections. My dad (who is only the greatest preacher alive: no brag, just fact) is always challenging me to slow down and meditate on Scripture. Literally taking it one word at a time and letting the richness of God's Word penetrate down deep into my soul. I find that really difficult to do. It's more natural for me to want to use an hour to read as much as I can than to take that hour and meditate on just one word or phrase. And the first chapter in God Is Able was all on that one tiny first word: "Now..."

Not only did she really break the verses down into bite-sized pieces, she filled each chapter with personal and practical testimony of God's magnificent ability. She didn't just theorize and philosophize and wax eloquent about the potential of God's ability, she shared ways she's witnessed His ability in her own life and in the lives of people she personally knows. What is one of the best ways we bring glory to God? We testify. And Priscilla really did that well in this book.

But she didn't just leave it at encouraging stories and anecdotal evidence, she backed everything with Scripture and more Scripture, drawing from the Old and New Testaments to illuminate these two truly astounding verses smack-dab in the middle of Ephesians.

I really liked that this book wasn't a theological mind-bender that takes determined concentration and effort to read, but it was still challenging and encouraging. This book draws your attention to God and His ability, and it gives Him all the glory. I would highly recommend it.

What books help you slow down and meditate on God's Word? What books have encouraged and challenged you in your spiritual development? 

A Tuesday Confession

I really cannot stand listening to female sports commentators.
Like, if we have to have them, can't we just stick them all in women's basketball and keep them out of the good stuff?
I'm not advocating that we give back our right to vote or anything, I just think there are some jobs better suited for men and this is one of them.
Does this make me a backwards, anti-feminist, "toxic masculinity" championing woman with a 1950s housewife mentality?

So be it.

Let's Bust a Recap : The Professor

Can we even believe it's July already?! The year is officially half over. Christmas is basically right around the corner, you guys. Somebody please make it slow down!

The first book I finished in June was The Professor by Charlotte Brontë. The Professor was actually the first novel Charlotte Brontë ever wrote. However, it was the only one of her completed novels that she was not able to get published during her lifetime, and honestly: I get it. It wasn't my favorite. From what I understand, she re-worked a lot of this novel into Villette which I own but have not read yet, so it will be interesting to compare the two when I ever get around to it.

This novel is about the young William Crimsworth (who I'm still not sure if I was supposed to like or not) and the story is written as a first-person narrative from his perspective. Through a series of events, he basically cuts ties with all his relations, moves to Brussels, and becomes an English teacher. 

The plot was mediocre (at best), none of the characters were likable (save one), and there was just enough French in this book to make me extremely frustrated that I don't understand French. My biggest and most important recommendation for you if you ever decide to read this book is to get an edition that has the French translated into English in the footnotes because there were times I was reading the book when I just wanted to scream. I was able to put enough together contextually to follow the story, but I'll tell you what, that's the first and last book I'll be reading from Kennebec/Chivers Press. (I bought this book in one of those $3 warehouses you see cheap billboards for on big-time roadtrips. Now I know why the books are so cheap.)

All in all, I wasn't impressed with The Professor, and I wouldn't really recommend it. Sounds like Villette would be more worth the time, and someday, I'll either confirm or deny that supposition on ye olde blog. Until that day, I say if you want to read Charlotte Brontë, go for Jane Eyre. 

Do you like the Brontë sisters? Which of their novels are your favorites? Least favorites? I have three left to complete my Brontë reading: Villette, Shirley, and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. Any suggestions on which should come next?