Wednesday, January 8, 2025

2024 Books

2024 Wrap Up

The Books I Read, in the order I finished them

Rebel Spy by Veronica Rossi

An engaging YA book based on an actual historical person known as Agent 355. Agent 355 was a New York society girl who spied for George Washington during the Revolutionary War.

The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner

“feeling angry signals a problem, venting anger does not solve it. Venting anger may serve to maintain, and even rigidify, the old rules and patterns in a relationship, thus ensuring that change does not occur. When emotional intensity is high, many of us engage in nonproductive efforts to change the other person, and in so doing, fail to exercise our power to clarify and change our own selves."

Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein

Why it's worth cultivating "habits of mind that allow [us] to dance across disciplines.”

“The challenge we all face is how to maintain the benefits of breadth, diverse experience, interdisciplinary thinking, and delayed concentration in a world that increasingly incentivizes, even demands, hyperspecialization”

All These Things Shall Give Thee Experience by Neal A Maxwell

"To ignore the hard doctrine deprives us of much needed doctrinal rations for the rigorous journey. The lyrics, "come let us anew / our journey pursue," suggest getting on with our impending mortal experiences, some of the most glorious of which will be adventures of the mind and heart, as we ponder and explore new truths."

"If it’s fair, it’s not a true trial."

Sacred Struggle by Melissa Wei-Tsing Inouye

I hesitated to pick up this book because I don't relate with the cancer struggle and thought it would make me sad to read about Melissa's terminal struggle. The first chapter was about physical pain, and it was tough but worth reading. I was surprised that the rest of the chapters were about other kinds of sacred struggles. Gender imbalance at church, LGBTQ connection, global church community. I could hardly put it down once I started. It feels like the conversation that I've been needing to have, to keep from exploding - or imploding.

I feel a sharp loss at Melissa's passing this year. Melissa's obituary

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doer

Werner: "I’ll be back in 2 years. Maybe I’ll learn to be a proper engineer. Maybe I’ll learn to fly an airplane."

Jutta: "Spend enough time with boys like Heinrich and Herman and you’ll become like them."

Werner: "I’ll write every week. Twice a week. you don’t have to show my letters to Frau Elena if you don’t want to. When I come back we’ll fly west. We’ll go to Paris."

Jutta: "Don’t tell lies. Tell them to yourself if you want to, but don’t tell them to me."

She saw it as a betrayal. But wasn’t he protecting her? Chapter 43.

Silas Marner by George Eliot

Recommended by Oak. I wasn't expecting the book to open with an exploration of faith crisis. I loved experiencing Silas Marner, the person, the hero, coming into focus.

“Perfect love has a breath of poetry which can exalt the relations of the least-instructed human beings.”

Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon (Sam Bankman Fried) by Michael Lewis

I was interested in SBF's parenting choices, the NYC trading culture, Effective Altruism, SBF's failed attempts to create a long-term relationship.

“We tried having some grown-ups, but they didn’t do anything,” he said. “This was true for everyone over the age of forty-five. All they did was worry."

Two Good People: Daniel Asay Tebbs and Nedra Henrie Tebbs. amazon link

The first half of this book is my Grandma's memoir, followed by my Grandpa's in the second half of the book. Memorable aspects:

the different family styles of the Asay's and Henrie's,
hardiness and skills of my grandparents as rural kids
Grandpa wanting to be his own boss and ranching instead of getting a job.
Grandpa's gratitude that his grandsons were being raised in an environment where not drinking was an acceptable way to grow up,
Grandma's gutsy letter that triggered Grandpa to get serious about marrying her - each of their perspectives on this moment
Grandpa's matter-of-fact account of his father's mental health breakdown

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

Xavier Bouc- outraged at all the lies. Hercule Poirot - loved it

Uncommon Measure: A Journey Through Music, Performance, and the Science of Time by Natalie Hodges

"It’s as though my mind has to toggle between two time signatures, that of my ego and that of the music, the two run along fundamentally different grades like cross rhythms where triple meter fights against double. One is a self absorbed interior time…the individual mind navigating its way through the world, while the other…the other contains a possibility of a kind of communal time in which you are in sync with others."

How to Stay Married by Harrison Scott Key

"I wasn’t any better at being a nonbeliever than I’d been at being a believer."

“Perhaps one day we will evolve ourselves into some better arrangement for the children, where benevolent armies of solar-powered robots raise children on expansive baby farms, but until Elon funds this nightmare, marriage is what we’ve got. It’s good for us and it’s good for the kids, even when it hurts like hell. I think often of our daughters and what they have learned of love in this strange season. I suppose we’ve given them enough trauma to turn all three into artists or writers, or at least law students. But we’re here, all of us: a nuclear family, detonated but not destroyed. We won’t be traumatizing our children with our divorce. We’ll traumatize them with our marriage, as God intended.”

The False Prince by Jennifer Nielsen

Sage's recommendation and a great book for a backpack over the Fishlake Hightop.

Harry Potter 5 by JK Rowling

The girls and I listen during Saturday jobs.

Undaunted Courage: Meriweather Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West by Stephen Ambrose

This book was more interesting because I had familiarized myself with the early European contact in the South Pacific. Memorable bits: sexist Virginia plantation culture, Jefferson and Lewis living alone in the White House, the differences between Native American tribe cultures, the horsemanship, and the singular focus on the fur trade as the main reason for exploration.

“It seemed unlikely that one nation could govern an entire continent. The distances were just too great. A critical fact in the world of 1801 was that nothing moved fasteA r than the speed of a horse. No human being, no manufactured item, no bushel of wheat, no side of beef (or any beef on the hoof, for that matter), no letter, no information, no idea, order, or instruction of any kind moved faster. Nothing ever had moved any faster, and, as far as Jefferson’s contemporaries were able to tell, nothing ever would.

First Bite: How We Learn to Eat by Bee Wilson

I thought - before reading this book - that if I ever made healthy food choices for an extended period, this would involve denying myself foods that seemed the most yummy or the amounts that seemed the most satisfying. This book convinced me that I can change my food preferences - and I have.

"hunger cannot be canceled by food per se. It matters very much what the food is. One of the reasons that hunger is so hard to pin down is that it is a negative concept, an absence. It is not-food, not-contentment.

The Last Anniversary by Liane Moriarty.

A classic Liane Moriarty book, so I loved it.

Topics: post-natal depression, marriage relationships (or lack thereof), the human condition

Setting: a fictional island off the coast of Scribbly Gum, near Sydney, Australia.

The Bomber Mafia by Malcolm Gladwell

A fascinating history of two generals in WWII who had radically different approaches to bombing.

Nonviolent Communication by Marshall Rosenberg

I aspire to nonviolent communication. I continue to listen to segments of this book every week or two, to remind myself of this aspiration and try to deepen my connection these ideas.

Awakenings by Oliver Sacks

Disease = dis-'ease'

Health = 'ease'

Sickness is a parasite on health. Health is the true self.

Familiarity with patients necessary to good medicine. No such thing as a side-effect. The disease is not as important as the palette.

"What surpasses every algorithm? It is art. Every disease is a musical problem. Every cure a musical solution. ...Music is internal arithmetic. Yet more. Since it sometimes 'works' and sometimes doesn't."

Good Energy by Casey Means and Calley Means

Implementing some changes in my life, based on this book, has made a noticeable difference in my energy and sleep. My stomach feels more comfortable, I feel lighter on my feet, I crave healthier foods, and I sleep through the night.

Solito by Javier Zamora

“Mom likes to call them my "angels," but I worry that takes away their humanity and their nonreligious capacity for love and compassion they showed a stranger.”
― Javier Zamora, Solito, about the people who helped him cross the border as a 9 year old

CU Boulder's Book of the Year, which means the author will be coming to campus for a few events.

2034: A Novel of the Next World War

I appreciated the author's interview at the end. How to make the world a better place: Education, STEM, Service to Country.

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell

"Historical details are sparse, but the true story of Lucrezia’s life and death – and the haunting titular portrait that survives to this day – was sufficiently juicy to inspire Robert Browning’s eerie 1842 poem, “My Last Duchess” (“That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall/Looking as if she were alive”) and, nearly two centuries later, O’Farrell’s new best-selling book, The Marriage Portrait."

The Book of Mormon

I got a used paperback copy from the church library - easily marked - and used it to teach Gospel Doctrine class every other week. Teaching sunday school was one of the more satisfying and meaningful undertakings of my year. Thank you to everyone who shared a classtime with me in the Boulder Ward.

The Influencing Machine by Brooke Gladstone and Josh Neufeld

I picked this book because Sage is reading it in AP English. I found the format somewhat hard to follow, but it was nonetheless a thought-provoking journey through the history of America, freedom of speech, and the media.

The Great Divorce by C. S. Lewis

"Then those people are right who say that Heaven and Hell are only states of mind?"

"Hush," said he sternly, "Do not blaspheme. Hell is a state of mind - ye never said a truer word. And every state of mind, left to itself, every shutting up of the creature withing the dungeon of its own mind - is, in the end, Hell. But Heaven is not a state of mind. Heaven is reality itself." p. 63

Saturday, August 10, 2024

2023: Year in Quotes

Joyce, age 12

Joyce: “I love this!!!”

Me: “Picking up garbage?”

Joyce: “No, being with everybody!”

Joyce, during our Christmas Eve highway clean-up

Did you know I could do a half over- and a half under-bite?

Joyce, getting braces on her teeth next year

“I didn’t really ‘get’ garages in New Zealand, but I get it here.” (After another cold snowstorm).

Jan 29, 2023

“Awww, Mom. I just want to DO something, not GET READY for something.”

Joyce when I told her to get ready for bed.

“Everything’s yay today!”

Joyce, living a happy life

“Nuggets are basketball; and Broncos are football, right?”

Joyce, with new-found Colorado pride.

“Ahhh, I feel so big-kiddy!”

Joyce, on her bike, leaving to care for cats and buy eggs for pancakes, July 1

Joyce: “I wish I could just go bald when I am camping.”

Sage: “No way, my hair is my one comfort when I am camping!”

Overheard while the girls were packing for Hancock Flat

“I remember MAVY better than our house.”

Joyce after Oak read his MAVY poem on Karetai Point. July 18, 2023

“Mom, we recognize things outside!”

Joyce, as we flew over New Plymouth

“My shoes went from 3 to 7 to 9!”

The Year of the Growth Spurt

“Our teacher went home sick at the last minute so we didn’t have a substitute. The teacher aide said we could have a study hall, but we decided to practice on our own.”

Joyce. Something is working well in that middle school orchestra!

“I thought they had different lyrics for the real thing.

Joyce regarding “give us some figgy pudding.” “I thought the whole thing was a Studio C joke”

“Mom, this is the funnest Saturday List I’ve ever had: Breakfast. Get Ted Talk ready. Shower. Sweep bedrooms. Color in chairs. Sew Noah’s gift. Two other gifts.”

_____________________________________________________

Sage, age 15

"That’s money!”

Sage, doing a take-home quiz for an American Government class, is incredulous when I tell her that “checks and balances” in an American Government class doesn’t refer to money.

“It seems like people don’t do things for fun here. They do things to get better at them.”

“I’m going to save this email forever.”

Sage, after finding out she got accepted to Joffrey Ballet School Summer Intensives.

“I’m sure lots of dancers have this problem.”

Sage, about snot flying out of her nose while executing fast turns at dance class

“I feel disabled, Mom.”

Sage, about why she doesn’t want to go to seminary the morning after getting braces on.

“You know, I live in soreness.”

Sage, regarding the life of a dancer. “The last time I had no parts of me sore was about a year ago. I live in a state of stiffness.”

“H- is the one other person I know that would thrive here. Because she works hard and looks out for opportunities.”

Sage, regarding differences between New Plymouth and Fairview classmates. Sometimes the intensity at Fairview is stressful and sometimes exciting.

“Sometimes we intertwine ourselves totally.”

Sage, talking about her and Joyce

“People are so friendly here! I felt like I knew everyone after just a week or two. In New Zealand, at my dance studio, it took a couple of years. Adults were friendly there, but it took the kids a lot longer.”

Sage, after dance. “Also in school." Americans have a reputation for being noisy and nosy, but, on the flipside, they are open to making a new friend.

Sage: “I don’t know why, but I think I’m my teachers' favourite student.

Joyce: “It’s because you always say 'thank you.'”

Sage- “I don’t think so. Other people here say 'thank you' too! People are so nice!”

Me: “Maybe it’s because you try hard.”

Sage: “No, lots of people try hard here. That’s another thing that’s different about here and NZ.

-Both girls agreed strongly about this in school and after-school activities. I’m not sure exactly what to make of conversations like this, but I am interested in puzzling it out. I never spent time in the schools like my kids did, so they have a different perspective than I.

“Joyce, this was such a bad idea!”

Sage, after putting scotch tape around her eyes and eyelid to remove dance makeup

“Things always seem easier at midnight, just saying.”

Sage, similar to many teenagers, finds staying up late is easier than getting up. “I’ve had a lot of inspiration at midnight that never happened.”

“Do you remember how confusing seasons were in New Zealand? I could never figure out why people bothered naming something that was so discreet. Now I kind of get it.”

Sage. “Is that the right way to use ‘discreet’? I’ve never used it before.”

“Can we tackle each other with VR??”

Sage, talking about the benefits of switching weekly family calls to VR instead of a video call. She said this after the weekend wrestling with Danny while visiting Utah for Grandma and Grandpa’s farewell.

“Guess what, I just invented a new equation! y = 3^(x+2) - 3^x”

Sage, with time to spare at the end of a math test

“Oh, I had seen those animals! I thought I was looking for a pig!”

Sage, about looking for groundhogs on the way to the airport.

“Mom, we should get walkers for us just for the next few days. It would just feel so good to lean on something.”

After she and Joyce ran the BolderBoulder 10K without any training.

“I’m bringing deodorant for EVERYONE.”

Sage, packing for a backpacking trip

“We stuck out our legs twenty times in different patterns at different angles. What? This is ballet.”

Sage, keeping it real

Sage: “Guys' names are so hard to remember. I do have one friend that’s a guy. I have one class with him. But I can’t remember his name though.”

Me: Call him 'Ben.'

Sage: “You can usually avoid saying their [boys'] names. I’ve gotten pretty good at it.”

“Mom, I don’t know if I should show my Halloween candy, because if everyone sees it, it will be gone so fast.”

Sage, experiencing a dilemma while tidying the house before Dad, Danny, and Noah came home for Thanksgiving. (I don’t think she was as worried about you, Ariann!)

“In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen”

When I asked Sage to bless the food, she paused and then gave this surprisingly truncated prayer, "In the name of Jesus Christ, amen." It surprised us all - even her. She said that her last conscious thought was to give a short blessing, and that's what came out.

“Their hands are clumpy and just hang there. And their feet don’t work.”

Sage’s observation of male ballet dancers after watching going to a Colorado Ballet performance in Denver

“Mom, I’ve gotten so good at ballet since we moved here. I don’t think you can even comprehend it. … except for partner dancing, I can see all the way through to professional.”

Sage’s report after wrestling with Danny and Joyce: “We had all the pillows against his face and then we could just lick him “

What is this? Dec 27th

_____________________________________________________

Mercy

“I don’t agree with Valentine’s Day”

Mercy, after her first experience with the American version of this holiday. “I don’t want a relationship to start on Valentine’s Day.”

“I used to hate it that I cry so easily. But now I often recognize that tears come when I’m feeling vulnerable, and then I realize that I WANT to be vulnerable!”

-I love this insight

Mercy: “I didn’t know if I should do leased or unleased so I just did unleased.”

Oak- “It’s called unleaded.”

Mercy: “Oh, so that’s why you were laughing!”

Mercy, with little experience driving a car even at age 18!

“The chapel’s dinging.”

Is this the way to speak of the Duke Cathedral?

Oak

“Remember you heard it from me first.”

Oak to his DOC and Te Anau friends after introducing them to ChatGPT

“It’s got lichen growing on parts of it.”

Oak, about his first car, which was given to him by a Torea.

Third Place at the New Zealand National Trail Running Championship.

“I've never gotten so close to pulling a PLB.”

Lake Unknown expedition, off the Routebourn, Oak and Mercy and Shar. “I was thinking about the fact that I’m the safety officer, and nobody from the club had pulled a PLB yet that year.”

“Anyway basically is super cool.” “I just read it all haha”

Oak, regarding an advanced copy of his book, 'Wonderfalls.'

Transformed from nerds into nerds-but-it’s-okay-now.

“Why is it so cold? Can we go sit outside?”

Sage’s first response to Oak’s Dunedin flat. This is the classic uni flat in Dunedin.

_____________________________________________________

Danny

“I can feel the electricity in my hangnails.”

Danny, New Year’s Eve, making a hydrogen collection device in the kitchen sink with 9V batteries.

“He grabs my arm like this and says, ‘Your software works, right?” “It was quite a moment.”

CEO at the TX startup competition told Danny about how he [the CEO] was spreading the word about Danny's company to all the other CEOs he knows, and how he had filmed their presentation and sent it out to to them.

“What if one of them is my computer???”

Danny, about becoming like the five people you spend the most time with.

"We won $885,000, but about $600,000 is not in cash but in investment."

It blows my mind when Danny says stuff like this so nonchalantly.

“Somebody will do it.”

Danny, regarding the idea for his company, Zaymo. “There’s a startup in San Francisco working on it, too. Out of Stanford.”

“What matching algorithm are we going to use?”

This was not the response I expected when I asked if Danny if he would be in charge of the family's Christmas gift draw.

“Danny was actually insane. He put style into it. He learned the moves AND managed to put style into it.”

Sage, regarding Danny’s dance moves during the mini-dance class that Sage taught us at our reunion.

“You don’t go back to being a Muggle after going to wizarding school.”

- Sandbox professor to Danny after Danny returned from Y Combinator

“Next time you come down make sure you have a girl with you. And don’t come back with a beard!”

Nana, looking out for Danny

“This [holiday] is great for my humility. I get beat in tennis, Dominion, Settlers of Catan, and ping pong … by my little sisters.”

Danny, Thanksgiving 2023

“It will be my gateway drug to what? To Ironmans?”

Danny, regarding his new cold plunging habit. Mike said that a cold plunge releases more endorphins than smoking cocaine.

“I’m kind of excited to die and see what the next life is like. I'm just so curious.”

classic Danny

_____________________________________________________

Noah and Ariann

“Do you know how I know so much about revolving doors? It’s family history.”

Noah to Joyce and Sage as we were walking around Boston. He explained about doing summer research projects growing up. Besides a project on revolving doors, he also remembers one on pineapple.

“I’ve lost my airport advantage.”

Noah, “I used to feel so much more confident in airports compared to other kids my age.”

“China will invade Taiwan by 2025.”

Noah, after a conference in Sept in COSprings. “China is all anyone’s talking about. They are our only ‘pacing partner.’”

“I didn't realize this until the end of the week, but I decided that going to the grocery store was my way of coping with Noah being gone. I went to different grocery stores Tuesday-Saturday and had way too much fun knowing which items I could buy at which store for the best deal. I've now put myself on grocery store probation for at least 1 week haha.”

Ariann, showing self-insight and self-control!

“We didn’t have a spreadsheet for that.”

Noah and Ariann said they were 'just' using 'casual math' to calculate that gas used to collect free Veterans Day food was about $10, rather than making a spreadsheet as per usual.

_____________________________________________________

Mike

“Since we moved back to America, I wanted to know what was in Costco, so I went up and down every aisle, and it was really fun.”

Mike’s shopping trip lasted from 10am to 3:45pm, after telling me, “I’ll be gone about an hour.”

“Was that your husband in Primary?”

Admiring women in the ward book group, after Mike substituted in Primary one week. “He was sitting there on the front row singing his heart out with such a big smile on his face the whole time!”

Sage to Dad: "Did you buy an iPad case like Mom’s or like Joyce and mine?"

Joyce: "Neither one. He bought a super fancy one that he can drop from thirty thousand feet."

Thirty thousand feet is quite a ways!

“One word of encouragement does not change a lifetime of example.”

Danny, on Christmas Eve, after Mike ‘encouraged’ him to stop snitching cranberry bread.

“One of the nicest things in life is to have a good set of tweezers. And now you have four.”

Dad to Danny at Christmas.

_____________________________________________________

Holly

“You’re looking sporty today.”

Maggie to me at university. This was the nicest thing anyone said to me after I got a black eye by dropping my phone on my face. (Lying on my back while using my phone.) Feb 7

"I think you should save those pants for when you are really hiking since they *are* hiking pants" (about my favorite pair of REI pants that I often wore to non-hiking events)

"I'm amazed that so many things looked good on you!" (so surprised!?)

"Just don't be one of those moms who only wears LuluLemon" (no worries about that - I bought my first item with her on Saturday).

An example of things Sage said to me while acting as my personal fashion consultant for a day! For Christmas, Sage gave me one day as my personal fashion consultant. We spent an hour going item by item through my closet and then went shopping. Sage was very tactful, but it was hard work.

“On brand” after Shar read my message about enjoying final exams.

“I'm telling you, you kids would have been much more medicated in your life if your mother hadn’t protected you from my medications.”

Mike to our kids

“The most inspiring thing I’ve read in the 8-9 since I started doing this.”

Oana, lab PI, in tears after reading my ‘more-personal personal’ statement. After submitting my first draft, she suggested that I be more transparent.

“I know some stuff.”

My exam mantra

“I’ve never once heard you ramble.”

Adelaide to me after a post-bach ethics interview questions practice night. This compliment hit home somehow!