Unbroken: a brief review

taken from goodreads.com

I first heard of this book back when it was written in 2010. WORLD magazine did a story about it and I remember sitting in awe as I ate my breakfast and read a summary of Louis Zamperini's life. I vowed to read the book as soon as possible, but trying to graduate from college turned into trying to graduate from grad school which turned into trying to survive my first year as a teacher (which I only just barely did). I started reading it this summer, but 20 pages into it my husband wrecked his motorcycle on the interstate and I spent some time taking care of him and - needless to say - not reading. Then my daughter was born. THEN, a friend recommended audiobooks and even though at first I thought it wouldn't make sense for me, Serial helped me realize that it makes a ton of sense for me and here we are. I have read Unbroken, at last.

If I thought Louis' story was powerful based on the WORLD article, reading the book was incredible. I know I'm not the first person to say this, but for a single person to experience even one of the horrifying things Louis experienced in the first 30 years of his life would be amazing. For one single man to have gone through everything that he went through is...incredible. That's the only word I can use to really describe this book and this man: incredible. Olympic medalist, plane crash survivor, stranded at sea, rescued by the Japanese, tortured in several different POW camps and eventually rescued, Louis experienced hardships that I literally can't even imagine. I feel extremely inconvenienced by having to wipe my dogs' feet before letting them inside when it's muddy. Louis was tortured in truly incomprehensible ways for years. It is incredibly powerful - and incredibly convicting - to read about such a life. I absolutely don't want to ruin anything about this story, but I must say that the darkness that fills so much of this book is completely eliminated by the incredible light that is the last few chapters. Those last few chapters, friends, are worth the entire horrible story that precedes them. Our God is one of such compassion, such love, and such amazing grace.

I think I need to say, though, that Louis' story is not necessarily the book itself. What I mean is that Louis' life is utterly incredible, and therefore reading this book was utterly incredible, but there were times that I felt the book was a little long winded or a little too detailed. There is a lot of subject matter in Louis' life that I just know nothing about and have a hard time reading about (planes, flying planes, the parts of planes...), and those parts were a little boring for me. I will say, though, that I think Hillenbrand did a great job documenting his life, and I do love how she incorporated so much historical and personal context throughout the book even though it did add to the length quite a bit. I do think that because of all of these things (the parts that weren't really my favorite, the length of the book), it was a perfect choice for audiobook. I think it would have taken me approximately the entire calendar year to get this book read if I hadn't listened to it, and instead it took me a week. So I will be hunting down and finding every audiobook on my list, and I'm super stoked about it.

Speaking of which, here's my progress on my 2015 reading list:

-Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
-Monster, by Walter Dean Myers
-Dash and Lily's Book of Dares, by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan
-The Rosie Project, by Graeme Simsion
-Eleanor and Park, by Rainbow Rowell
-Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, by Mindy Kaling
-Yes Please, Amy Poehler
-A Long Way Down, by Nick Hornby
-This is Where I Leave You, by Jonathon Tropper
-Wild, by Cheryl Strayed
-Serena, by Ron Rash
-finish the Harry Potter series

And I'm like 20% through The Rosie Project. And it's not even February yet. I consider this incredible progress.

Yes Please: a brief review

taken from amazon.com

Well folks, I'm only a couple weeks into 2015 and I can already cross one of the books off my goals list for this year! It helped that there was a deadline of book club to get this read by...and it helped that it's college bowl season and I just don't really like college ball but my husband does. I didn't love this book all that much, but I did love finding the time to read amidst a screaming, snotty, teething 3 month old and rainy days that make dogs really unhappy. Reading just looks different now, and it's not as often, but I'll take it when I can get it.

So, Amy Poehler. I just love her, don't you? Except...after reading this book...I don't really as much. I love Leslie Knope, but as it turns out Amy Poehler isn't actually Leslie Knope. She just plays her on TV. Leslie is smart and hilarious and dorky and never does anything that might be considered "bad." Amy is smart and hilarious and super inappropriate and did/does a lot of drugs. It made me sad to read and I had to start binge watching Parks and Rec to cleanse. True story. That being said...there were definitely parts that were great. It was mostly pretty funny and I laughed out loud a whole lot; I also skimmed a lot of chapters/passages that were just entirely unnecessary. As one of my dear friends described it: "you did drugs and your apartment was weird. We get it." Yeah...there was a lot of that. There was a lot of stuff that I just didn't understand (I don't live in your world of improv and therefore nothing you are talking about makes any sense to me) and endless references to people that I was too lazy to IMDb (no I don't actually have the last twenty years' worth of SNL cast members and writers memorized).

But there was also a lot that I enjoyed. Like the entire introduction that I highlighted the crap out of, which was full of sentences about writing that I found to be so encouraging. And like the descriptions of her sons (Amy actually put into words what I too have caught myself feeling at times: you actually really do want to eat your own children they're just so freaking adorable). All in all, I give it an "eh." It was entertaining at times and super boring at times, and she's not Leslie Knope in real life. But I guess I should have seen that last one coming.

Goals, new and old.

And just like that, 2014 is over. I thought I'd take a few minutes to remember that I have a blog (because, you know, I've blogged twice since Charlotte was born) and reflect on my goals for 2014 while also sharing my goals for 2015.

I went into my 2014 goals with the idea that they were just goals. They weren't "resolutions" to hang over my head and make me feel like a failure; they weren't yet another checklist in my life stressing me out. They were just supposed to be a list of goals that I wanted to work towards. I had every intention and desire of completing them, but I made a promise to myself that if I didn't get them all done I wouldn't beat myself up. And I think that's where I can honestly say that I am. I didn't finish the whole list. There were a couple things that just didn't happen (like my reading goals...more on that later), some that I just didn't work hard enough to make happen and they are now on my list of 2015 goals, and a big chunk that I did actually get done. I'm proud of those. And I'm proud of the books I read even if I didn't get as many read as I wanted to. I got things done and I crossed things off and really, isn't that the point?

When I started thinking about what I wanted 2015 to look like, I had to take into serious consideration that I have an infant now. I still want to do things and accomplish things and grow, but I also realize that Charlotte has changed how I spend my time so much. As I continue to adjust and figure out what being productive with a three month old looks like, though, I want to start getting back into some of the things I haven't been making time for. So I have goals, but only the truly important and/or realistic made the cut this year. They range from deeply personal to basic and somewhat silly, but they're my goals nonetheless.

Reading Goals: instead of setting a number of books as my goal, I'm choosing instead to focus on a list of books that I want to make sure I actually read this year. I hope to read many more than just this short list, but this is the list that I've been interested in and putting off and I want to actually get them read. So this year, it's happening. 

• Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
• Monster, by Walter Dean Myers
• Dash and Lily's Book of Dares, by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan
• The Rosie Project, by Graeme Simsion
• Eleanor and Park, by Rainbow Rowell
• Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, by Mindy Kaling
• Yes Please, by Amy Poehler
• finish my book-to-movie challenge list
• finish Harry Potter series

Personal Goals: 

• Figure out the exercise routine that I didn't make happen in 2014. So here's the thing: like every single person's New Year's exercise goals, I started out strong and joined a gym and got pregnant and had severe, round-the-clock nausea and stopped going to the gym. I did go on a ton of walks this summer (when I had the gall to claim that I had successfully achieved my exercise goal), but basically...I didn't get this done. My Christmas present, however, was a treadmill and I'm in love with it. Plus, I had a baby three months ago. So, yeah. 2015 is my year. 
• Get into a better place with the dogs. Without getting too far into this, having Charlotte has done some really bad things for my relationship with our three dogs. A lot of feelings and frustrations that I'd ignored or failed to realize were even there have come out swinging in the last three months. It's not been super enjoyable for any of us, and at the end of it all what I've realized is that I have a lot of work to do. 
• Redo wardrobe. I've been thinking a lot recently about downsizing and the value of having a smaller, more intentional wardrobe. Using fewer, key pieces to mix and match rather than having a million pieces that are outdated, don't fit me well, and don't serve much of a purpose. This one is probably going to be a gradual process but I'm excited about it. 
• Rediscover Jesus. This one is extremely personal so I'll keep it short as well, but I felt like I couldn't leave it out. I've done a terrible job of investing in my relationship with Christ, and I wish I could say it's just been since Charlotte was born. Again, I'm keeping this one short but I have an incredible amount of work to do here as well. 
• Learn sewing basics from Mrs. Mayhew. On a much lighter note, I didn't learn how to sew last year. Not even a little bit. A friend's mom did offer to teach both of us the basics sometime though, so this is me saying I remember your offer, and I'm cashing in at some point this calendar year. Kelly, let's make this happen. 
• Clean the shower. Yes, I'm a little embarrassed that this is on my official New Year's goals list. But you know you don't clean that stupid thing either. They're the worst. The absolute worst. I scrubbed ours yesterday and it was awful, and it occurred to me that maybe if I do it more than three times a year it wouldn't suck so much. 

And that's my list. Short, sweet, but there are some pretty heavy things in there that I'm diving into headfirst. Bottom line, I want this year to be meaningful. I want to get to the end of it and see tangible change. Tangible results. I want to be able to point to things in my life and say "I did that. I accomplished that this year, because this time last year I saw a problem in my life and decided to fix it." I'm excited for this year. I'm excited for what's ahead.