Happy New Year to all! For the past two months, I've been trying to post everyday, but for the New Year, I am going to scale back and not post every day. I am just as impacted by the news as everyone else and quite frankly, I was exhausted by the end of December. And it wasn't just from having to shovel snow everyday for the past week. This week we seem to be shoveling a lot of misinformation and a fabricated video to project a one-sided message favorable to those who want to continue to promote hatred and division in our great state. On the positive side, at least our home state newspaper is calling it out for what it is, fabricated misinformation.
For January, I'm going to focus on recommended book titles. I shared a form in a previous post for readers to submit suggestions and I have had a few responses, so I will be using those in future posts. I won't share my resolutions, wishes, or goals for 2026, other than my hope that somehow we can find ways to be kinder to each other.
What I will share is two of my morning inspirational readings and close with a statement that was always made at the end of our weekly service at church by a former deacon:
“To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting.” e.e.cummings
"O great spirit help me always to speak the truth quietly, listen with an open mind when others speak, and to remember the peace that may be found in silence." Cherokee prayer
"Go forth in the world and know there are deeds of compassion and courage that will never be done unless you do them, and words of hope and healing that will never be spoken unless you speak them." Deacon Barbara Mraz
Here's to hoping we have a kinder year in 2026.
