The last Sunday in March, I spent like two hours trying to bring my vision for this page to life. I am not a technological human; I know The Basics. Managing this blog and the behind-the-scene layouts and customization . . . it is all very overwhelming.

BUT!

I finally prevailed and designed the new home page I didn’t really know I wanted, but I’m happy with it! It’s still a work-in-progress, but I’m proud of myself for sticking with it.

Only a good two hours into this project, Anthony suggested we watch a movie. I got to pick and chose The Greatest Showman. Ant still hadn’t seen it yet and he didn’t nix it, so I ran with it.

I’m on the verge of crying at any moment during this movie, even right from the beginning. I love all the songs. They match their scenes, their characters, and the characters watching in the scene so beautifully. Barnum’s passion and creativity and knack for making the world him and his family live in and the circumstances they go through seem magical are inspiring. He doesn’t give up. (Anthony had mixed feelings about it, but he did say overall it was good.)

It gave me the kick in the pants I needed to tackle this post again.

This is going to be a list of all the books Anthony and I own that I haven’t read, but that I want to. This year I’m moving it to the internet in hopes it will help keep me (more?) accountable. It’s inspired by those . . . 101 Things in 1,001 Days lists that I literally had to Google to know what they were called. I love that @thelazygenius’s post was the first result in the search, but from my very brief internet search they originated here and you can learn more about them here.

I challenged myself to do this last spring because I own a lot of books I’ve wanted to read at some point and haven’t made the time yet, so I’m starting again.

The main rule: read all the books we own (that made the list) before buying new ones or checking out any books from the library.

And it worked.

Mostly.

Weeeelll, for a couple months.

Until our anniversary trip last July—Hello Pacific Grove and Bookworks! And then the Writing Intensive I worked through last August-ish that required me to read a book in the genre I was working on. And then Christmastime. (I’m sure there were more.)

That was the main rule though—read through all the books we own before buying more. As I just shared, that didn’t happen.

The second “rule”: Of Anthony’s series books, I would only write down the first book in the series that interested me.

However, as my interest in Fantasy and Dungeons and Dragons increased, more and more of his Fantasy series sounded interesting. And Ant also bought books on our anniversary trip—and I am a sucker for Thriller novels—so I added those to the list as well.

So, I’m starting over. I’ll link it to the new homepage. It will be easier to access and everyone (myself included) won’t have to scroll through more recent blog posts.

Life is too short to read books we don’t want to read, guys.

The last and most important rule: I don’t have to finish the book. If I’m not interested in it at any point, I can put it down. Life is too short to read books we don’t want to read, guys. It’s not about who can read the most books they disliked. It shouldn’t even be about who can read the most books. Let’s just read books we like. And that’s not to say we shouldn’t read books that are out of our comfort zone or get us out of our box, challenge our thinking, etc. We should definitely read books like that. They’re good for us. Fiction, often times, can be a more powerful teacher than Non-fiction and facts because there is a certain power and vulnerability and magic about Story that Fact doesn’t always have. Only you know what you want to read at the time. I can’t decide that for you. As for me, if I pick up one of the books on this list and I’m not interested in it at that time, I will set it aside. Maybe I’ll keep it and keep it on the list. (I’ll probably keep it #lowkeyhoarder over here.) Or, I can add it to the Donate pile. One of the positive things I’ve discovered during this quarantine life: there are at least two Little Free Libraries near me—one at the park in town and then one at the Justice Center right in the front lobby. That’s where I’m headed once we can go out in public again and function like we used to.

Currently, I don’t have a time frame for this. It’s not read Certain Number of Books in 1,001 days. Or, Read Percentage of 126 books by This Month. Maybe I’ll come back and add a condition like that, but right now that doesn’t exist. Especially since we’re quarantined and independently-owned and local bookstores need their people to support them.

I know myself well enough to know that even if I read through ALL of the physical books before buying another physical book, I would immediately buy more books after that because 1. It would be a huge chunk of the goal completed, and 2. I don’t read e-books fast. Especially since over half the e-books are Non-Fiction writing books, I know I won’t get through all of those this year. Honestly, I might never read most of them. The one I can guarantee I’ll finish sooner rather than later: Twirl because Callie Feyen writes magic. Nothing is concrete right now.

So, hop over here to see my to-be-read (TBR) list 🙂

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Writing Notes:

// 3-29-20: 34 mins. on the floor next to our bookshelves. listening to Dave Barnes’ Me and You and the World. Words: 826.

4-12-2020:

// 55 mins, adding titles and authors names, light editing. listening to Dave Barnes song on Spotify. on the floor next to my bookshelf/dining room table. 437 words added. total: 1263 words.

// 8pm(ish)-10pm=2 hours. talking thru Ant’s bookshelves with him. Editing, counting, adding titles and Authors. Listening to Dave Barnes on Spotify (a shuffled playlist of all his albums). Started out in Ant’s corner, then moved to dining room table. Words added: 760. Total words: 2,023.

5-2-2020:

// Alphabetized the titles of the books in each section. added photos. and finally posted it! final word count ended up being 2,011 words.

7-26-20:

// Finally changed the List of Books to it’s own post. Some light editing, but over all the same 🙂 “Write” playlist on Spotify. about half an hour. Total words: 1,120.