On Not Reading and Weeding

I've been finding Week 4 of AW really frustrating.  The no reading thing has been difficult, and I'm afraid I'm losing brain cells because of it.  On the upside, I'm just as glad to have an excuse not to read some of the things I insist on reading:  the subway papers (as surprisingly interesting as they are sometimes), and the magazines that pile up in our apartment:  Rolling Stone, Time Out, L Magazine, the Lo-Down (art directed by one of our early guest bloggers, Kim).  There are so many to distract me! 

So this part as been good.  I've also been listening to music more, mostly in the way of YouTube clips and channels.  A had an XTC channel going last night when I was cleaning out the kids' room to prepare it for painting, hauling up armload after armload of weeded picture books.   I must have collected next to a thousand for my kids over the years.  And while, we are holding onto a lot, I'm getting rid of a lot, too, dispersing them around, trying to sell some to a local used bookstore.

 Instead of reading, I've been reorganizing and weeding (in library land, we call this "de-selecting") my own book collection.  I've also been building decorative book towers like the one above, based on this shelving unit pictured below. 

It's been frustrating, however, maddening handling all my books without being able to read any of them.

Since this is still a six-month assessment, one of my New Year's resolutions was to see more live music, so tonight I saw Joseph Arthur, the same musician I saw (in the same venue) on Jan 1.  From the stage that night, JA read his New Year's resolutions.  Tonight, I wanted to ask him how they were going.

Equinox Assessment

First cone of the season at Ray's Candy Store on Avenue A 

It's the Spring Equinox! Yeah!--although I wonder if we've heard it given our wimpy little winter. Now it's been 2012 for almost three months, and I thought I'd take a minute to see what I've done that I wanted to do when I was thinking about this year--the night Lara and I started this blog--on Dec 31st. 

Have I checked anything off my list? 

 Where are my New Year's Resolutions anyway? I just checked two different places!--help! 

 Ok, here's what I remember: 

1. More yoga! Really? I've only been to one, maybe two formal yoga classes this year. I practice at home, but it's not the same. 

2. Write and submit fiction. I've written. I really have, but have I submitted anything anywhere? No. And I just heard some disappointing news in this regard about an hour ago. (March, you are a killing me! Really!!) 

3. Try and get out of my tight place and thinking less tightly. Well, more yoga would help with this. But I am trying to breathe more consciously and more deeply. And I am keeping up with a journal, and trying to be more conscious of how I move through the day. 

4. More love.  Just like the sign above says!  Need to work on this.

5. More light!  Needs work!

6. More tights! I actually did well with this one! On Sunday, I wore my yellow tights. I saw daffodils everywhere. Today, however, it was so warm that I peeled off my leggings on a public sidewalk. 

 On January 1, 2012 I went to hear this singer/songwriter Joseph Arthur play. He read his New Year's resolutions--numbering about 40--from the stage. One of his was: "Let dreams learn how to be true." This I'm definitely going to work on for the next three months. 

 What about you?

The Crow

Lara, this post will be short, because this New Year's Day consisted of hosting in-laws in back-to-back activities, but I managed to wear tights, plain black tights that one might wear to a job interview although I'm still in a holiday bubble. With them, I wore flat boots of leather so soft the boots go on like socks. Hours later, I went home and changed into red Frye engineer boots that I've almost broken in, because I wanted something that hurt a little for the live music I was going to see later.

Lara, I like your last post a lot. I went to see a performer named Joseph Arthur, who is a cross between William S. Burroughs and Chris Robinson from the Black Crows, and with something of the dead drug addled comic Mitch Hedberg. He made me wonder what it would be like to live in art all day, even when you are parenting, even when you are irritated or totally exhausted, or worse: jealous.

He read some of his 2012 resolutions--he had about 40 of them--from the stage and I jotted some down in my brand new red Moleskin appointment book:

--Eclipse fear.
--Let dreams learn how to be true.
--Carve from invisible stone your true love.
--Be generous.
--Accept yourself with love.

By the way, I burst into tears and sobbed during one of his songs. And by the way, the crow used to be easy for me, too, and now I can't do it at all.