Jibun Techo & Reading Journal | Week 31 in 2021

Well, hello August. The summer weather has been hanging around the last couple of days and I’m trying not to be disappointed. July was perfect for me! And I suppose a little suffering is to be expected in August. Despite the warm weather, we managed to spend most of the weekend outside, which has worked really well for us this summer!

My two big streaks are going strong – today marks 492 days of journaling and 226 days of meditating.

After my wobbly July, my intention is to simplify in August. So far, so good! This week has been full of simple things: school with the kids, playing outside, reading, and writing. My four food groups!

I didn’t document any exercise this week — I don’t think I’ve written about it here, but I’ve been struggling with plantar fasciitis over the last year and it really ramped up in the last week or two. Even yoga has been aggravating it! So I’m icing my heels as much as I can (which often translates to more reading time!) and trying to stay off of my feet — which is downright impossible most evenings and on the weekends. I’m just trying to get past this flare-up so that I can get back into some sort of exercise routine.

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Reading Journal

I’ve alluded to my new reading journal in the last few posts. You might remember that I already have a notebook devoted to listing the books I’ve read, but this one is different. I was inspired by the journal that Mary started this year and finally decided to start my own after I finished Klara and the Sun. That was one of those books for me – I was left sitting at my desk, full of questions and ideas and had no one to turn to. I didn’t want to lose all of those thoughts, so I pulled out a defunct notebook (which, funnily enough, was a reading journal that I started back in 2017 in which I made a ton of notes about My Cousin Rachel) and got to writing. This notebook is full of spoilers, but I can share this one picture:

(Don’t worry – there are no spoilers in this family tree. The death documented happens in the prologue because it’s the axis from which this story is told.)

This is the family tree I cobbled together from my current book, The Arsonists’ City. So many of the names are unfamiliar to me and I was becoming confused about who was who, and who was living where. I check this family tree constantly as I’m reading to keep myself straight – especially when I’m trying to figure out who is in Syria, Lebanon, or Palestine (which doesn’t really exist? It’s all so confusing!), because that part of the world is like a puzzle to me.

I’m doing my best to use my notebook to jot down little details that would normally be lost to me. I’m hoping this helps me with my reading post on Wednesday — for instance, I finished a Maisie Dobbs mystery last week and sometimes those types of novels blend together for me, and the details are already fuzzy just a week later. But I have some good notes about the big picture ideas I walked away with and think it will make my little blurb just a little stronger. So exciting and worth the work!

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I think that’s it from me on this Monday morning – have you noticed how much darker it is lately?! I can’t believe how quickly that happened. But I’m planning to be back on Wednesday with a reading update, as long as time doesn’t slip away from me! Take care!