Lolling about with a novel - holiday bliss.

Yesterday I did something I haven't done in a while. I spent the whole day reading a novel. The novel in question was "The Goldfinch" by Donna Tartt, winner of this year's Pulitzer Prize for literature. The last thing I did before sleep the night before was read more pages. I reluctantly stopped for sleep.  The first thing I did upon waking was reach for the book. I stopped for breakfast and then placed a chair on the verandah to take advantage of the autumn sunshine and took my spot. I stopped for lunch and then finished at about 4pm. I raced towards the end because I was so engrossed in the story. Upon finishing I felt simultaneously satisfied - as if I had just finished a delicious meal - and bereft, because the story was gone. 

I think "The Goldfinch" is my new favourite book of all time. 

It's a long time since I've been free to completely absorb myself with a novel in this way. It's also been a while since I have loved a novel so much that I feel part of the story. It reminds me of Easter holidays long gone. 

Returning home from boarding school or university, it was nothing for me to stay in bed with a big novel. I read Peter Carey's "Oscar and Lucinda" and "Illywhacker" in single, day-long sessions, emerging bleary-eyed and jet-lagged from my trip into other places through the pages of a book. 

Taking literature subjects at university, with their demanding reading lists, meant homework was a pleasure, even if the choice of what to read next was dictated by upcoming assessments. 

I find the choice of "what's next" after such a big, satisfying book as "The Goldfinch" difficult. After such absorption and connection with one writer I find the switch to another author can be jarring. My choice this time is a slimmer book: "The Italian Girl" by Iris Murdoch - my book group's next choice. The gears changed as I opened to the first page and began the task of reorientation. They are still grinding a little, but I'm sure we'll settle in together. 

Having finished the novel, I now understand a conversation I had with my local Yarraville bookseller about the Booker Prize winning "The Luminaries" by Eleanor Catton - another big, fat book which I enjoyed immensely. The bookseller hadn't enjoyed "The Luminaries" because she was part way through "The Goldfinch" when she grabbed it to take on her Christmas holidays. She was dismayed to discover she had the wrong book and was forced to commence "The Luminaries" while she was stranded, remote from her copy of "The Goldfinch". Devastation! Disappointment! Frustration! Restlessness! All would have ensued. 

I'm amazed that in such a busy year I've managed to finish two huge novels - along with six others!

How do you like to read? What are you reading now? What's your favourite book?

My view from the verandah. The aeroplanes were very busy. 

Copyright 2014 divacultura

Is it over already? Reflections on 2013.

Happy New Year!

As is customary, I've been doing a stock take of my activities and projects during 2013. It's interesting to think about individual projects as a body of work as the big picture can be quite impressive.

On the knitting front I completed:

20.5 pairs of socks. (The second part of the 21st pair will come off the needles in the next couple of days.)
6 scarves - three were commissions from friends
4 hats - including a fireman's hat for my five year old nephew
1 jingle ball - for my three year old niece
1 teddy bear - also for my three year old niece.

Apart from the completed items,  I also have a semi-circular shawl on the needles and a short-sleeved winter cardigan partially completed. It stalled because I don't understand what to do next. I must find out.

My crocheting yielded a chunky bathmat made from recycled tee-shirts and LOTS of granny squares. It's hard to know how many I made in 2013, but I know that I started on 16 July 2012 and finished my 146th (and last) square on 4 August 2013. I plan to stitch these together to make a 12 x 12 big blanket.

In between all that handwork, I also reached my reading goal of 25 books. It was touch and go for a while as I wrestled with a couple of long and difficult books (The Accursed by Joyce Carol Oates in particular), but I got my mojo back, stopped being distracted by games on my iphone and just scraped in. (Pictures are from my Goodreads.com page - sorry about the weird formatting...)

I was interested to notice that there are six non-fiction titles amongst all those novels. I also see I started and finished the year with the same author - Janet Evanovich - for some very light reading. The book group I started just after I moved to Melbourne in 2001 is still going strong. Books we read this year were:

Bring up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel - Winner of the Man-Booker Prize for 2012. We read the winner every year. I've just started last year's winner, The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton.

Madness: a memoir by Kate Richards was one of my suggestions for the group and I was pleased with the result. The book is incredible and the discussion that resulted was stimulating and satisfying. I've lent the book to several other friends since.

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion is a commercial success, but was less than loved by our group.

The Dressmaker by Rosalie Ham was funny, gothic and poignant all at once. Very enjoyable.

Mateship with Birds by Carrie Tiffany was well-received, but covered similar ground to The Dressmaker. I loved the author's first book, Everyman's Rules for Scientific Living.

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick was a surprise package in its intrigue.

Letters to the End of Love by Yvette Walker left little impression and I finished it out of duty.

Ten Days in the Hills by Jane Smiley was one of my recommendations when I discovered that one of my favourite authors was not well-known in the group. It's not one of my favourites, but I did enjoy it. There's a marvellous passage late in the book in which Smiley describes the relief of tension amongst a group at the end of a high stakes conversation. It's genius and worth the slog for writing like this.

I'm setting my target again at 25 books for 2014. I'd rather reach the target and feel satisfied, than feel pressure because I didn't make it. And despite all this reading, the collection on my e-reader continues to grow!

I also sang in two jazz gigs at the Paris Cat jazz club, participated in the myki customer experience panel, survived surgery, consolidated my business and co-authored a chapter in a book which is to be published. And of course, consolidated divacultura as a happy part of my life (I hope it's a happy part of yours too!)

Sorting out my spare room remains on the list of things to sort out in 2014, but first I need to finish that pair of socks. My commitments for 2014 are still under construction.

Happy New Year! How was your 2013? How's 2014 shaping up?

My favourite things - this week

It's the day after yesterday and woke up again to more sexism.  This time West Australian radio announcer Howard Sattler thought he'd use the privilege of access to Prime Minister Julia Gillard to repeatedly ask whether her partner Tim Mathison is gay.  That he thought it was okay to ask is bad.  That he harangued and repeatedly asked as he said "I'm not saying this, but people are" is terrible.  That he is "flabbergasted" at his sacking really says something about the man.

Why is this included in a post of my favourite things?  Because the radio station acted swiftly and sacked him.  No namby-pamby suspension and then quiet reinstatement later when everyone has forgotten - gone.  Congratulations 6PR.

Baz Lurhman's film, "The Great Gatsby" took up most of the holiday for the Queen's Birthday on Monday.  I loved the film.  I loved Leonardo Di Caprio's performance and Joel Edgerton and Carey Mulligan.  And the music and the swoon- worthy fashions.  My favourite moment though was the footage of a young Queen Elizabeth II with the message "Happy Birthday Liz" played before the film at Yarraville's Sun Theatre.  "Oh yeah," I thought, "that's right...that's why it's a public holiday today."

Loved this piece on the 10 books people will judge you for reading.  I've read 4 of them and have no intention of reading the remaining 6.  E readers are a god send.  That's all I'm saying.  (I will make no mention of being ensconced in "World War Z - an oral history of the zombie war" at the moment.

It's well and truly winter in Melbourne and I for one am enjoying the chill.  It gives me plenty of opportunity to show off my selection of handknitted scarves and fabulous hosiery and boots.  The rain is a bit annoying, but it hasn't stopped me achieving my daily target of 10,000 steps in the Global Corporate Challenge.

Monday nights and The Voice are still a great moment in a week's television viewing.  The final is on this week and I reckon Harrison will win.  I was sad to see Miss Murphy go - it ruined my perfect record of predicting who would go through.  I will look forward to Danny Ross' album.

Lastly, I need to finish now so I can make some more sourdough toast with a smear of Maggie Beer's pate to accompany a glass of peppery shiraz. Mmmm.

My favourite things this week

Today I played the role of a woman whose partner has some kind of cardiac event before her very eyes, about four weeks after open heart surgery.  Luckily, I had the pleasure of working opposite a man with whom I work regularly and is a good friend.  We drove in together and started to play our characters from the moment we greeted each other.  We were asked several times during the course of the day whether we are partners in real life.  Other people who knew we weren't continually stated that we looked like a couple.  I'm constantly amazed by the power of acting and it's always fun to play scenes like this with a person you know.

Working out how to delete books from my Sony e-reader is a major achievement.  There are forums all over the internet and none of it made much sense.  I just started pressing buttons on the reader and it worked!  This is my standard approach to technology and it generally works.  A known issue with the reader is that it will sync multiple copies of each book from the software on the computer to the reader.    Apart from being annoying, it meant I actually ran out of space on the reader.

Related to that, I thought I had an SD card in my reader, but discovered that I only have a piece of grey plastic, shaped like an SD card.  One of my favourite moments!

The change of season from summer to autumn is finally happening.  We had rain, wind and cooler nights.  I even turned on my electric blanket last night before I went to bed - just to take the chill off the bed.  It's always fun to rediscover the rest of the wardrobe - all those gorgeous scarves I've knitted.  It also means I don't resent the days I have to wear a suit for work.

I recently discovered the band, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals.  I've been listening to the album all week on LOUD.  They're great!

This morning I didn't have to start work until 10:30am so I was able to sleep until after 8am!  Bliss after a series of 5:30am wake ups.

How was your week?

Weekend recovery from "Flight"

I had forgotten the blissful promise of an unstructured weekend ahead.  Not because my weekends are usually structured, but because my working weeks are unconventional and unpredictable.  Lately, business is booming and I'm actually working five days a week.  I have no complaints about this, but when I went to bed last night exhausted and woke up this morning, two hours later than on any of the previous five days and without an alarm to prompt me, I was looking forward to the weekend.  Until a couple of weeks ago, I would have had choir rehearsal to attend, but I recently left the group I was with and so there wasn't even the call of my beloved music.

Reading in bed is one of my pleasures.  I do it every night before sleep, but rarely have the opportunity to do it in the morning.  This morning I did.  I could have stayed there all day, but the lure of blue skies and temperate weather (Melbourne in autumn!) was too strong to resist.

Not a bad spot to wait for a train.  Yarraville.
©divacultura 2013

I walked to the village.  Wandered around.  Cashed a money order I had received. Sat waiting for the train, not really caring if it never came.  Visited my favourite dress shop and found something to spend a loyalty voucher on.  Then I decided to go to lock myself away and go to the movies.

"Flight", the film that saw Denzel Washington receive an Oscar nomination for best actor, was on and so I went.




It's quite extraordinary.  The beginning of the film paints a picture of Captain Whip Whittaker on an ordinary working day.  We see him prepare for the flight and imagine what it must be like to sit next to a co-pilot that we're meeting for the first time.  There's rough weather.  Things start to go wrong.  The rest of the flight is one of the most evocative pieces of cinema that I've sat through.  I felt like I was on the plane and felt the fear and stress of knowing that the plane was going to crash.  Tears started to run down my cheeks.  I couldn't breathe.

What's interesting is that the plane crash isn't really the point of the film.  It's the story of a man's path to face what he is denying: that he is an alcoholic.  The courage it takes to shepherd a diving plane to the ground with minimal loss of life is nothing compared to the courage required to recognise your own self destruction and betrayal of all the people who love you.

It was worth sacrificing some sunshine for this amazing experience.  I highly recommend the film, but I hope they don't show it when I catch a flight in a couple of weeks.

As for the second day of this two day expanse, I have nothing to look forward to except the prospect of nothing in particular and anything I want.

What are you doing this weekend?

My reading list

The pile never seems to get smaller!  I'm actually quite content with that - I know I will never run out.

My book group met yesterday to discuss "The Secret Scripture" by Sebastian Barry.  It was given to me as a birthday gift last year by a friend who adored it.  She and I generally like each others' choices, so I knew it would be a winner when I recommended it to my book group.

If you haven't read this book, put it on your "must read" list.  Roseanne Clear is one hundred years old and living in an asylum in Ireland when she starts to write down her life story.  Dr Grene is the resident psychiatrist faced with the demolition of the asylum and the need to decide where the patients should go.  He is trying to discover Roseanne's story, in particular, the circumstances of her committal.  Through these two characters we are exposed to the twists and complications of twentieth century Irish history.  Again, I am left wondering about the role of love in the Catholic church.

I'm revisiting the beginnings of New Journalism with a collection of essays from Gay Talese.  His book, "Thy Neighbour's Wife" was on the reading list for the New Journalism subject I took at university.  I read all the others, but somehow missed this one.  One of his most famous essays gives the title to the collection I've borrowed from the library, "Frank Sinatra has a cold".  It's marvellous.  The first essay in the collection is called Vogueland and was written in 1961 about Vogue magazine.  He is a wonderful writer and I'm enjoying these shorter pieces.

The next selection for the book group was featured recently on the Tuesday Night Book Club on ABC television.  I didn't see the program, but the woman who served me at the bookstore told me they have sold three hundred copies since the show aired.  The book is "Crossing to Safety" by Wallace Stegner, with an introduction by Jane Smiley (one of my favourite authors).  Apparently he's one of the most important American authors of the late twentieth century.  It's incredible that I've never heard of Wallace Stegner as the last fifty years of the twentieth century American literature is where I focus a lot of my reading, starting with subjects at university.  Very happy to discover him now.  The book looks terrific.

Hilary Mantel's second Man Booker Prize winner is "Bring up the Bodies" which my book group will read over the summer break, as is our custom with the Booker Prize winner.  It's (mostly) an enjoyable tradition.  Some of us are feeling less than happy at the prospect of this one.

On the non-fiction pile are:

"How Music Works" by David Byrne (of Talking Heads fame)
"Flourish" by Martin Seligman
"Eating Animals" by Jonathan Safran Foer
"I'm Ok - you're Ok" by Thomas A Harris
"As One - individual action, collective power" by Mehrdad Baghai and James Quigley


Lastly is "The Sweet Poison Quit Plan" by David Gillespie.  It's become my go to guide, rather than a book I'm reading from beginning to end.

That should keep me occupied for a while.  What are you reading?

My favourite things - this week

1. My diary for next week is my favourite thing this week.  There is NOTHING in it!

Empty
(c) divacultura 2012

 It's not often I feel happy about that, but with the recent frenetic pace, I'm quite happy to know that I can spend some time at home.  I know there's a lunch date sometime.  I have some accounts work to do.  I have some follow up from the empathy project.   These things can all be done at home.  That feels really good!

2. Getting dressed and ready for today's job.  I didn't even have to get dressed if I didn't want to.  I didn't have to shower.  Didn't do my hair and applied no makeup.  I picked up a pair of holey jeans  and a stinky t-shirt from the laundry pile.  Today I was playing a woman suffering from paranoid schizophrenia.  She is currently homeless.  It was a tough gig, but the wardrobe requirements were a dream.

3.  Flying on a plane with no audio visual distractions.  Usually I love the inflight entertainment, especially on longer flights.  Flying back from Brisbane last night there was not a screen anywhere to be seen.  I took the opportunity to put in some quality reading time.  I'm now 100 pages from the end of "Freedom" by Jonathan Franzen.  I'm loving it!  I did plug my ipod in and enjoyed the soundtrack to the Almodovar film "Hable Con Ella" (Talk to her).  It's gorgeous and perfect in the background.

4.  Surprising dining experiences in regional Australia.  I've been out to Traralgon a couple of times in the last couple of weeks, pulling into the Century Inn, right on the highway.  I sighed the first time I pulled, not expecting very much, but I was soon happily surprised.  The food in the restaurant is sensational!  I enjoyed a rib fillet steak with lyonnaise potatoes, baby leeks and red wine jus and a rocket, pear and parmesan salad on the side.  Beautifully cooked and bursting with flavour.

5.  Lipstick pink hire cars.  Everyone looked at the car as I zipped along the road.  It was fun, but I don't think I'd buy that colour.  Resale would be hard, but it would be visible in the parking lot.

Lipstick pink Yaris
(c) divacultura 2012

When I was eleven

Today I popped into the Sun Theatre in Yarraville to see the film, "I am Eleven".  It's a series of interviews with eleven year old children from all over the world.  They talk about their lives and share their thoughts on life, culture, religion, war and many other things.

If you can, take the time to see this film.  It is funny, astonishing and humbling.

It's extraordinary to hear Remi from France talk about the three types of love there are in the world: love for family; love for people you know, but who aren't your family; and love for people you don't know.  I haven't spent a lot of time with eleven year olds, so I don't have a benchmark to know whether this is what eleven year olds generally sound like.  Remi also had clear views about racism and the French Government's tough immigration laws.  It was incredible to hear him speak and refer to himself as a citizen of the world.

Vandana and Ginisha live in an orphanage in Kerala in India.  They have meagre possessions and speak about never having known a father's love, yet they see the beauty in their shabby, even squalid, surroundings.  Their wide smiles and ambitions for themselves in the face of a very hard start in life brings tears to my eyes.

Billy from the UK has a perpetually worried look on his face and an adult turn of phrase.  He's a comedian but it's hard to know if he knows this.  He speaks about growing up, getting married, having children, grandchildren and then "boom, it's all over".  He seems non-plussed but the cinema audience roars with laughter.  His favourite films are "Dirty Dancing 1 and 2" because of the great dance moves.

Kimberly from New Jersey in the US precociously enacts the scene of her future marriage proposal.  Her Jersey accent is pronounced and it all happens on one date.  It's a boy she will meet in college and he will tell her that he likes her hair.  It's all over after that.

Since seeing the film, I've been trying to think about what I was like at eleven.

I know that I had reached the height I would be (167cm) and had already reached puberty. It was really hard to buy age appropriate shoes.

I was bigger than everyone except the Egyptian girl Dahlia Aziz which meant I had to play Goal Defence or Goal Keeper in the netball team and was always cast in the male parts in school plays.

I had piano lessons, played for as many hours a day as I possible could and attended "gourmet cookery for children" classes with Mrs Quade at the TAFE in Toowoomba.  This meant I cooked dinner for the family on Tuesdays.  I look back at the recipes and laugh at the idea they were considered gourmet, but still remember techniques I learned there like how to skin fresh tomatoes for cooking.

I was in love with Bo Duke (played by John Schneider), the blond one from the TV show, "The Dukes of Hazzard" and would throw a tantrum if I wasn't allowed to watch the show.  My bedroom was wall-papered with pictures of him I had torn from American fan magazines.

I would ride my bike all over town.  I was given a new bike after my brother dismantled my old one and had pieces left over after reassembly.  My parents asked me to take the garbage outside which I did in a huff and returned.  I hadn't even seen the brand new bike waiting for me!

Days would be consumed by reading novels, one after the other.  I think it was at about this age I decided that I would read every novel in the school library, starting with the letter A.  I think I made it to C.

It was at the age of eleven that my worst dental experience occurred, leaving me with a lifelong fear.

My best friend was Angela Seymour.

I think I was in love with Philip Hamilton or Treg Kleidon or one of those boys.  I don't think it was reciprocated, but Philip did attend a college ball with me while we were at university.

I wanted to be an actress or a writer or a musician.

It's interesting to think how much of the person I am today, thirty years later, was evident at the age of eleven.  A good age I think.

What were you like when you were eleven?  Would you recognise yourself?

Indulgence day

It's been one of those days.  With the Anzac Day public holiday and grim wintry weather, I had no incentive to leave the house.  So I didn't.

I slept in! Enjoying the feeling of warmth under the covers while my nose and ears felt the cool air in the room.  I read a book in bed for a couple of hours and realised that I'm going to need better book reading light.  It's been such a long time since I had the opportunity to read in bed that I hadn't noticed.

I cooked a proper lunch:  puy lentils braised with onion, garlic and olive oil, tossed with diced red capsicum and continental parsley and dressed with red wine vinegar.  This was served on toasted pumpkin sourdough bread with homemade beetroot relish.  I crumbled some Danish fetta over the top and served it with baby spinach and rocket leaves.  Delicious!

I indulged myself with some solid DVD watching (Season 2 of the Australian series, Spirited) and made the time productive by keeping my knitting needles active.  Outside the wind blew, the rain fell and inside seemed a very sensible and appealing place to be.

It's been ages since I had a day like this.  I've been on the go constantly, including interstate travel which means when I'm home there's always stuff to be done.  Or I end up working.  It's the nature of being self employed.  I'm not complaining.  It's just not as easy to work when most of the country is on a holiday.  No one was contacting me for a start.

I'm glad I took today for myself.  I have a very busy end to this week and then a solid week of work next week.  Seizing the day doesn't have to mean frenzy.  It can also mean quiet indulgence.

What did you do today?

Stacked

Contemplating my photo for today (bedside), I'm looking at the pile of books.  There's always a pile of books on my bedside table.  You should see the one on the other side - it has an even taller stack.  And my bed head has a secret compartment and above that there's space to put even more books.  Then there's the stacks of books against walls and lying two deep in book shelves.  It has always been so.

The stack of books beside the bed may look the same for months on end, but that does not mean I'm not reading.  There is never a time when I am not reading at least one book.  I borrow books from the library.  My strategy to reduce the number of books coming in to my house is to reserve the ones I want to read and then pick them up when they're ready.  That's one of the reasons the pile may not move much.

Where I can't borrow the book from the library and there is some reason for me to own my own copy, I try first to buy it as an ebook for my Sony ereader.  At least then there's not another physical presence taking floorspace.

When that doesn't work, I will buy the book and it will be added to the pile.  If it's not the kind of book I need to hang onto, I'll turn it over at my local second hand bookstore.  The discipline when I go there is to not come home with more books than I took in.

All my friends and family know that I love to read so they tend to give me books for birthdays and Christmas.  I love them for it.  I think they are brave imagining they can choose something that I have not read or do not already own.  There are two friends whom I recall getting sucked into a hell loop as they delivered my birthday gift.  It was a book I had read.  They asked me to tell them if I had read the book already, so I did.  They took it back and exchanged it for another title which on presentation was discovered to be yet another title I had already read. In one of the cases they returned with a cute pair of socks instead.  In the case of the other friend, she went back and forth about five times and then it became embarrassing and frustrating for both of us.  I can't remember what happened in the end.  Maybe I lied.

In these days of blogs and apps like "we read" on facebook or websites like librarything it's possible to tell the world what you're reading, what you've read and what you'd like to read.  Maybe that will minimise the risk of needing to settle for socks.  I took it as a good sign that both of my friends had a very good idea of what I like to read.

I have to take a longish flight tomorrow and am looking forward to some uninterrupted reading time.  I'll be taking a couple of books because I know I'll finish one on both legs of the journey.  On the way over it will be "American Journeys" by former Prime Minister Paul Keating's speech writer Don Watson.  (So far I've visited New Orleans post hurricane Katrina and now I'm in Birmingham, Alabama.)  I am yet to make my selection for the return journey.  Something light I think.

Solitary vs social

Today's prompt for NaBloPoMo is "Do you enjoy being alone? Would you rather be around other people?"


I feel the question is around the wrong way.  As it stands my answers are "yes" and "yes".  


Anyone meeting me would peg me as an extrovert.  I'm quite happy to walk up to people I've never met and strike up a conversation.  I seek people out and enjoy activities that require me to play with others.  I'll happily chat to the tram driver, the person behind the counter at the post office, the person who serves me my coffee.  I've also had my extroversion certified through the Myers-Briggs type indicator.  The first time I was profiled I was deemed ENTJ (the E stands for extroversion).  The second time I was revealed to be ENTP.  So that's that.


Once I was at an event and a friend rang me up to see if I could find a particular person who was attending the same event and deliver a message.  I had never met the person whom I was to find and there was a hint of hesitation in my friend's voice as the request was made.  Without hesitation I agreed.  My friend thought this was amazing and quickly gave me the information I needed to be able to find the recipient of the message.  Off I went.  I quickly zeroed in on the person I thought it was and walked straight up and asked whether they were such-and-such.  


Two women were sitting together and the woman sitting next to the woman whom I approached answered in the affirmative.  I told the story and delivered the message.  The women then wanted to know what information I had which allowed me to find them so quickly.  Now this was awkward as aspects of the description were unlikely to be considered flattering.  So I didn't reveal, pretending that I had special powers that enabled me to identify strangers in any setting.  They were charmed and satisfied.


From this highly extroverted situation, I can adapt to enjoy being alone.    There are many things I enjoy doing which are solitary activities, but I have managed to also extend them into social activities with other people.


Reading is part of my daily life.  I always have at least one book on the go and my e-reader makes packing to go on holidays much easier as I have room for things other than books in my luggage! Spending time reading is a great pleasure, but I'm not really on my own.  There are many characters whom I have encountered in the pages of a book who feel like they are part of my life.  Holidays from boarding school meant going home to western Queensland where there was only one television channel.  I would spend hours lying around, finishing huge novels with astonishing speed.  I read Peter Carey's "Oscar and Lucinda" over the course of a day, followed closely by "Illywhacker".


When I first moved to Melbourne over eleven years ago, one of the first things I did was establish a book group.  I wanted to expand my network in my new home town and thought that doing it through my passion for reading was a good way to go.  We've been meeting about once every six weeks ever since.  People have come and gone from the group but there are still two members from the early days in the group.  It's a lovely way to combine the solitary pursuit of reading with a social gathering in a cafe or bar to share ideas and food.


Knitting is the other thing I love to do.  My Grandmother taught me and I spent many happy hours knitting side by side with her.  I find it hard to just sit and watch television; instead I knit while I'm watching.  It makes the time feel more productive.  I occasionally attend a stitch and bitch group - again making the solitary activity a social one.  A group of women from various backgrounds meet once a week in a Richmond cafe for dinner, chat and knitting.  It's a great way to get help and share the satisfaction of completing a piece of work.  


I have learnt to happily spend time with myself.  I also know that there's a limit and I'll start to crave the company of other people.  That's when I head out into the world to see who's available to make friends.  But if I had to choose one or the other for the rest of my life, I would choose to have people around me.