This year has been very different from anything anyone has ever experienced. The COVID-19 life has been full of fear, isolation, and stress. Many people with kids (of all ages) are watching them struggle with the new normal of not seeing people they care about, more screen time then we ever thought we would allow, and generalized anxiety about how this impacts them. That last one will tip you off that I have teenagers.
In this atmosphere I am working to maintain my own identity. My brain has not been able to process things as well as I used to. I am spending hours playing solitaire; I pick up books just to put them down; and I don’t even spend the time finding new titles online.
Then we went on vacation.
I should tell you now that I have been known to not move for a week, except to turn pages. I spent a week on Martha’s Vineyard and read 8 books while still spending time with the group of people I went with. We were headed to the ocean with my in-laws, so I needed to make sure I had things to do. I packed a book and an eReader. First, I read The Ambassador’s Daughter by Pam Janoff. The characters seemed familiar but I couldn’t place them until I posted on goodreads.com. This is a prequel to The Kommandant’s Girl and The Diplomat’s Wife. Each story can stand on its own, and I read them years apart. Each was an interesting take on the world, but nothing was earth shattering.
Then I started reading the only other thing I had downloaded – The House by the River by Lena Manta. The story of a strong woman who followed love, made a life for herself and her five daughters, and watched them grow and leave the small village under Mount Olympus. The story of each child is then told, each left with their own goals and choices, and lived their lives. In the end, the power of love, and the hope to start anew bring the women all together again, wiser and more aware of the good place they came from.
This has stuck with me. My mother made so many choices for her three daughters, and we have all gone away to live our own lives. Each of us, in our own way, has found our way back to mom and the comfort of the love and familiarity of where we came from. The women’s lives were lived full of passion and adventure, either by direct path or not. Born from love, they sought that out, if at first or not. The stories of these sisters have pointed me back to myself. In order to survive and thrive I must live fully with the choices I have made and the places it has taken me. If I do not, I would not be true to the parents that raised me to be fearless.
Now, I am fearlessly reading books again, even if I have been stopping the heavier reads and going to more non-fiction, it is reading. And I feel better.
The Source 4 Books 