I mentioned earlier I’d brought two books on my trip to the Netherlands. The second one was a bit of a last minute, surprise choice for me. Not long before I left, the Chaplain and I were taking one of our evening walks past one of the Little Libraries that dot our city.
As we sometimes do, we stopped to look inside. I’d actually brought books with me to put into the library, another way of losing weight before the trip. I hadn’t planned to bring any back home.
Then, I saw Tuesdays With Morrie, by Mitch Albom. I knew it was a classic. I think it’s common high school lit reading. I’d never read it. The talk on the cover of life lessons was attractive to me. The slim size of the paperback appealed to my traveler’s sensibilities.
I tucked it in with a couple of other books I’d chosen, and we went on our way.
When I’m packing for a trip, I always spend some time working out which books to bring and how many. I typically think I’ll read more than I actually get to. I also usually travel with my family. But this most recent trip, I’d be traveling alone. So the books I was bringing were going to get my full attention. Also, I was going on retreat, so it was important that I was putting the right stuff in. I needed to bring books that were physically lightweight and easy to carry since I was traveling alone and not checking any bags.
In addition, I was super, skin-crawling anxious ahead of this trip, and knew I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on anything too heady or deep, at least on the way there.
Crazy Rich Asians met the criteria on all counts.
I am so excited to share this book today, because it represents a wonderful first. It was recommended to me by my 11-year-old, Two. She read it, told me about it, then she left it on my book pile and told me I should read it, because it was that good.
She tells me about books all the time, and she is a voracious reader, but this is the first time she was so direct with a recommendation. And true to her word, it was a great book.
So, reading Furiously Happy opened me up to reading more books about anxiety.
I decided to acknowledge anxiety as the uncool friend who never leaves you alone when I had my third kid. My first inkling that I was the nervous type was a day in my high school cafeteria when a guy friend suggested I was a little too uptight (*shrug* I probably was). But until now, besides the general work I’ve been doing to better understand what makes me tick and how I can cope better with my life, I had never done any reading specific to anxiety.
In typical over-achiever fashion, before I’d even finished Furiously Happy, I chose three MORE anxiety titles, for a total of four, and planned an anxiety book-reading binge. This whole time, I had a nagging feeling that an anxiety book binge was a bad idea.
I know, it’s not summer. But November is when we need start to need an escape the most, am I right?
I heard about this World War I era historical fiction novel by Helen Simonson from a dear friend via the post, which felt completely appropriate. I immediately requested it from the library, and it did not disappoint.
It was the best kind of historical fiction.
