An Impromptu Evening

 We enjoyed a "special" gathering at Esther's home last Wednesday to spend some time with member and friend Chris Peek before she heads south again in October.  The meal shared was wonderful as was the conversation.  We discussed "The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho, one of Esther's two book selections.  A tale of a young man in search of his personal legend.  We discussed moments in our lives when we followed our instincts and have been all the better because of it.  We also discussed thought-provoking philosophy on religion and the universe.  "...all people who are happy have God within them.  And that happiness could be found in a grain of sand...because a grain of sand is a moment of creation, and the universe has taken millions of years to create it."  "...The winds know everything.  They blow across the world without a birthplace, and with no place to die.  I have inside me the winds, the deserts, the oceans, the stars, and everything created in the universe.  We were all made by the same hand, and we have the same soul."

Written

 Lovely to enjoy a "picnic" gathering at Chris M's homesite.  So nice to get a tour as final steps are finished for certification of occupancy.  Great home and wonderful views!  Thanks to all for the shared foods.  As always, delicious!

This month's read was an adventurous memoir "Written in the Waters" by Tara Roberts.  A history of African slave trade, expeditions of sunken slave trade ships and a deeply personal search for home and self.  Beautifully written, you end up feeling like you know the different locations visited as well as having an understanding of history that you were never taught in school.  

The author gives you the opportunity to see life from a different view, not from that of a privileged American background.  While she was trying to find a send of home, she learned that she had to change how she defined herself in this global world.  We all have to reckon with the legacy of colonialism and the history of slave trade.  "Are you looking for Utopia?  Where in the world is there a place where those things are not happening?"  One needs to go beyond the anger, pain, guilt and shame.  "Africa was never static; it continued to change and evolve culturally....there are new possibilities for imagining the present and the future as a dynamic group - a moral home rather than a physical one."  "I have begun to think of my journey as one that travels a wavy path.  The design of my life doesn't run narrow and straight."  "All my life, I've been shaping myself like water, writing myself within her waves."  "I realize just how much of our stories have been written in her (Yemaya) waters: lives lost but also lives started, all those lines of connections that we are just beginning to see and understand."  

Very Intriguing

 We enjoyed a Boston themed meeting at Maureen's home.  As always a delicious array of items shared.  Our read this month was "The Woman In the Library" by Solari Gentill.  Ms Gentill wrote the Rowland Sinclair mystery series and has won the Australian Crime Writers Best Fiction award.

This was written as a story within a story; an author is writing about an author writing a mystery.  It has many layers, twists and turns and everyone becomes a suspect at one point or another.  There are many implications and the author leaves the ending to the reader's interpretation.  One point we found interesting was the statement that "all books are romance books."  Much to think about.  Quite a read!

A Happy Wander!

An enjoyable time for all at Mary's home.  We feasted on pasties, green pizza,  salads and strawberry shortcake.  Reflecting our movie theater theme, Judy Bell brought Milk Duds and I brought popcorn.  Nobody went home hungry!

Our book was "Virgil Wander" by Leif Enger, a captivating and whimsical novel which took us to small town upstate Minnesota.  Full of humor, it viewed several aspects of life; its meaning, its heartaches, its second chances for redefinition, its forgiveness.  Life not unlike that here in Entiat.  The small town movie theater was a replica of the Ruby Theater in Chelan; this story seemed so familiar.  I wrote several pages of quotes in my notebook and found this novel left me full of optimism for mankind.  

"...I admire....your solitude.  I never imagined such luxury."

"The surface of everything is thinner than we know.  A person can fall right through, without any warning at all."

"Your tribe is always bigger than you think."

"Everyone wants to start again....Why are we here if not to grow!"

Enjoying the "Luck of the Irish"

We enjoyed a lovely meal and evening at Judy Bell's home, complete with Irish music in the background.  The one day everyone gets to be Irish and enjoy green and Irish cream!  Chris brought a photo album of an Irish adventure to help us "set our scene".  A delightful time with pleasant conversion.

Our read this month was "The Library at the Edge of the World" by Felicity Hayes-McCoy.  It is "an empowering story about the meaning of home and the importance of finding a place where you truly belong".  About a whole community that connected in a web of mutual support.  One of those fell-good stories which we all enjoy, filled with lovely prose.  

"But a librarian should know better than anyone how written words, moving through time and space, could change a person's life.....for millennia, written words had conveyed dreams, visions and aspirations across oceans and mountains....She was part of a process that stretched across distance and time."

Judy shared this St Patrick's Day blessing:  "May your pockets be heavy and your heart be light; may good luck pursue you each morning and night."

"As always it was delightful to “break bread” with all of you.  The wonderful soup, the various breads, broccoli salad, and other tempting items made a full dinner.  The conversations, the discussions the books brought up, the warm fire and community information passed around - made our time at Judy’s special."   -Judy Bell 

 "He feared he would be stuck forever in that winter...."  War is declared and everyone's lives are forever changed.  One young man, training to become a doctor, learns that "what constitutes illness in war is not the same as peace....Since when was our goal to cure them?  It's to return them to the front....Patch and send....He had worked under the magical assumption that when he stepped away the misery abated"....But disease of the mind "seemed as something different, unrelenting....No wound at all, at least not one you could see...."  The doctor finally is sent home but "the dreams pursued him.  'I thought returning from the front would ease these troubles; unless there is a battle I don't yet understand."