Optimism Springs Eternal

I went to the library's annual booksale today and, true to form, my optimism won out and I bought 6 books that I fully intend to read: War & Peace (hardcover. That will be my summer project); The Red Badge of Courage (one of those books I always MEANT to read but....); Women In Love (have I ever read anything by D.H. Lawrence? I know I saw the movie about 20 years ago...) The Prophet (Kahlil Gibran..never read the whole thing but we used the essay "on marriage" when we got married almost 17 years ago: "And stand near together yet not too near together/For the pillars of the temple stand apart/And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow." Words to live by!); Stones for Ibarra (by Harriett Doerr, my inspiration! A smithie who won the Nat'l book award for this book, her FIRST novel, which she wrote in her 70's! I've read this before but I want to own it for motivational purposes); and The Old Man and the Sea (Hemingway...I've also read this one but I want to take another shot at it. Why is it so revered by writers?) All this for $5.50 and my library is so enriched!

Writing class ended today with everyone reading their essays on what it's like to be the age we are now. I got all choked up reading mine (how embarrassing) when I got to the part about Noah's autism so the instructor read it for me. So much positive feedback! Nice people in the class, so interesting. I'll miss their stories. Now I have to motivate myself to write. Can do!!