Down, but not out

If you follow this blog, then you know that this month has not been a good one for my challenge. I started out valiantly trying to see the sunrise and it died pretty quickly. Truthfully, with my nocturnal tendancies, seeing the sunrise every day was just not feasible. But that's okay. I saw a couple and I was well rested for the rest of my life this month. And this month has been crazy. Women hurting me, guests visiting, work kicking my butt. September will be a busy month for me too, but I hope that my September challenge will fit into my life a little easier.

This coming month's challenge comes straight out of Eat, Pray, Love. I went to see the movie a couple of weeks ago and I loved it. I thought it was a great movie that you had to be in the right (or wrong) place emotionally to truly appreciate. If you've seen it, then that should tell you where I've been emotionally. I have been lost in the soul of another person and, while I still love her, I want to move out of her soul and back into my own.

I thought for a while that my efforts to focus on who I am rather than who I am with her were selfish. I thought that I should be focusing outwards, on other people I love, rather than inwards on myself. But you know what? I love myself and I have to keep working on that. I am not always an easy to person to love (yes, I do know that) but there are a lot of things about myself that are wonderful. When I get lost in the soul of a woman who doesn't want me, it's too easy to only see the flaws she sees. So now for the challenge.

I am not a meditating person. The idea of sitting in one place thinking about nothing is kind of painful and boring sounding to me. I don't have any interest in yoga (although tai chi sounds appealing). So this month, I will meditate. As the creepy old guy with no teeth told Liz in the movie, I will meditate and smile. Smile with my face, smile with brain, smile with my liver. Not really sure how I'm going to achieve the last one, but I will try. I will try to meditate for 10 minutes a day, more if I feel the need to. It's a pretty well documented fact that smiling will make you happy and I need that. So, if you are like me and you need to be happy with who you are again, I would also challenge you to join me. Join me in making yourself happy and not relying on someone else to do it for you.

Sunrise and worship

As of this morning, I have seen the sun rise twice this month. The first two days of the month I was too tired to stay up that late, but I managed it on the 3rd. This morning's sunrise was interrupted by my father waking up and turning a bunch of lights on. In order to really appreciate the shifts in the natural light, one must not be surrounded by artificial light.

I've been enjoying watching the sunrise, actually. We have a pond in our backyard with a lot of animals living there, so it's fun to listen to the birds wake up. It's silent one moment, then one bird makes a noise, and then whole set of them start talking. I also like watching the shifts in light. I studied stage lighting in college, so it's fun to look at the colors in the sunrise and compare them to the colors in the sunset. I like watching the leaves on the trees go from one dark blob to barely distinguishable individual dark leaves to green leaves.

Watching the sun rise also makes me wish I was into Earth worship. I don't actually want to worship the Earth, but I think it's silly to remove the Earth's cycles and properties from your worship of the Creator. Watching the sunrise makes me want to be in a circle with candles at the four corners, chanting and singing. Maybe that sounds silly, but it's what I want. I don't actually think I will (my father would not be pleased to wake up to me chanting) but it's a nice thought. This morning I ended up thinking more about a personal situation than what I was watching though and I kind of wished I didn't have to sit there with nothing to do but think and watch.

Moving on

Well, it's that time of month again. Time to reflect on this past month's challenge and prepare to move on to the next one. I wanted a challenge in July that didn't demand much from me. I wanted to be able to relax a bit from the daily challenge stuff and what I chose did provide that relaxation from me. Unfortunately, I think I relaxed a bit too much. I only got through Jane Eyre this month. I have been reading a lot of Shakespeare and I read parts of 1984 and Atlas Shrugged (my favorite book). I also read The Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy and parts of The Thinking Woman's Guide to a Better Birth and The Historian. I was hoping that I'd actually read more classics this month than I did, but all it really motivated me to do was avoid my bookshelf. I disliked that. So, we won't be doing this challenge ever again.

For August, I am returning to the daily challenge. This month's challenge will be seeing the sunrise every morning. I am nocturnal by nature and I like it that way. However, this whole challenge thing is meant to shake me out of my routine and place me in the path of new things. I have enjoyed the few sunrises I have seen in the past, so there you go. I am not restricting myself as to what I do after the sunrise though. By that I mean, I can stay awake to watch the sun rise and then go to sleep or I can wake up in time to watch the sun rise. I'm curious to see which one I do more often. I'm hoping that this event-driven sleep schedule will force me to be awake more and get more done with my day.

Shakespeare

David Copperfield is still sitting on my desk, trying to avoid my kitty cat's claws. I don't know why she chooses to attack a book I want to read and not The Sun Also Rises. If she liked attacking Catcher in the Rye I would happily get copies of that piece of trash for her to shred too, but no. She chews on my old homework and tries to shred David Copperfield and Harry Potter. My poor confused baby.

I suppose I have been mostly reading classic books lately, but not with the single minded pursuit I hoped this month's challenge would bring. I have been studying and working like a fiend lately. That means a lot of reading that stupid, stupid CAM book and pretty, pretty Shakespeare. I don't think there are many people out there who would debate Shakespeare's place on the classics shelf, so I'm still safe with that. I have set aside my pregnancy book in favor of work and Law and Order, so less reading there too. Overall, I feel like I'm not reading at all, but I know I am. It's just all work reading. Still, if my job involves reading Shakespeare, how bad can life really be?

Getting distracted

Well, I've already broken the rules this month. On the plane ride home, I couldn't bring myself to suffer through any more of The Sun Also Rises. I just don't like it and I believe it has been abandoned for greener pastures. For right now, the greener pastures are The Girlfriends Guide to Pregnancy. I am not pregnant, but I love reading about pregnancy and to have that shiny new book in my carry on next to David Copperfield was just too much temptation. I gave in and amused myself with this very funny book and it has remained what I want to read. (I really hate starting a book and not finishing it if I want to.) So, for now, I am trying to read the Guide quickly and get back to Challenge.

One down

Well, reader, I finished Jane Eyre on the plane up to Maryland. If you've read it, do you think that the ending kind of sucked? I don't mean the plot points of the ending. I think that Charlotte Bronte produced a lovely happy ending. I simply mean that I felt like she didn't want to end the book or maybe she didn't know how. The writing at the end felt rushed and half cocked to me. Perhaps she ran out of time and had to write the last chapter more quickly than the others? I don't know.

I've been pretty busy here in Maryland, but I have started reading The Sun Also Rises. I'm kind of amazed that it's considered a good book. I'm a few chapters in and have yet to find the writing or the plot engaging. Hemingway introduces characters without explaining who they are or what their relationship to the protagonist is. I don't have a problem with that as long as you explain their relationship shortly after the introduction, but that hasn't happened yet. Hopefully, it will get better as it goes on.

Jane Eyre

I'm now about 3/4 of the way through Jane Eyre and I hope to finish it today or tomorrow. It was a slow start, but I am completely involved now. I kind of think Mr Rochester is an ass, but I think it's really just that Charlotte Bronte is awesome at writing men. Because really, how many men still use the "I'm going to find a new woman half my age because my current wife is an embarassment who won't have sex with me" trick? I'm proud of Jane for not falling for it. No offense to any "other women" out there...

I have about 5 hours of plane time (not to mention airport time) in my future, so I should have some fun reading this week. I stopped by the library to pick up Great Expectations for my trip. Alas, the library here sucks and they didn't have it. They did have David Copperfield, though, so that's coming with me up North. I also grabbed The Sun Also Rises. I hear that Hemingway is "so romantic" but that he's "a misogynistic pig who spent half his life hanging around Picasso trying to screw his leftovers". But that's coming from "a bitter, self-righteous hag who has no friends", so I may have to chalk that up to her being a "Miss I Have An Opinion About Everything". Seriously, points to you if you get my references. One of the best Shakespeare movies EVER.