Category Archives: love

2025 year in review

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As I look back on 2025, what stands out most is the increased flexibility in my schedule. I had more time to move freely, to travel solo, and to hear myself think. I need this quiet time to thrive, and so 2025 was a step in the right direction–with even more schedule flexibility coming around the bend.

Last spring was marked by a bumper crop of new baby Shetland lambs, in so many colors! It was a charming time to shear and sell fleeces and to watch the sheep grazing in lush green pastures. I am so grateful for my little farm, for the renewing cycles of living with livestock and for the peace that the animals bring.

Professionally, I’ll also remember that spring as simultaneously deeply successful and deeply stressful. A promotion process went sideways, and it took months to resolve (thankfully, it did resolve positively in my favor). There was also amazing book news. This is the year that I saw my first book begin to populate on all major bookselling websites. 2026 is shaping up to be another big year for reading and writing, with my first book expected to be published in spring and my second book to follow shortly thereafter in the fall. Not one, but two books in one year?!?! I have to pinch myself. It’s truly a dream come true. And there are more projects in the works too, in addition to the books. Look for more birth work, birth classes, and more writing projects from me! Although all of this takes time, years even, these projects are now well underway.

The summer was spent in pure bliss–I spent my days writing hard toward daily goals and my afternoons reading outside on the porch where the weather was perfect for months on end. The weekends were spent on tiny adventures, and, of course, more work, because I still love my work. It was hands down one of the most productive AND restorative summers I’ve ever had, and I hope to repeat that schedule in years to come.

The highlight of the fall was a solo trip to Louisiana to celebrate 10 life-changing years with my love, and that was truly a transformational trip. I felt my old self again. I felt possibilities opening up. I felt freedom and satisfaction. It was also something I hope to replicate in years to come–finally breaking away from old routines and rigid “to do” lists. To be fair, those routines and “to do” lists have also saved my life over the past seven years, so I’m grateful for those too, and they will certainly continue!

Despite neglect and precarity, in the fall my garden produced a bumper crop of pumpkins and zinnias, along with the usual jungle of colorful hollyhocks, which I love. I also traveled to San Francisco for a work conference in the fall. These conferences usually feel less like work and more like rejuvenation and inspiration too. I returned in time for the avalanche of holiday activities and “to do” lists and I felt deep gratitude for my family and this season and tried to savor the swim lessons and holiday concerts and artwork–all of those unique and fleeting hallmark moments.

The big theme in 2025 was stretching my wings a bit more than previous years allowed, and it felt so good. I felt more myself again, more room to breathe, more room to move. I am looking forward to so much more of that in the years to come. It sometimes seems counter intuitive, but I feel that I have more to give to my loved ones when I also have time to care for myself. In numerology, 2026 is a 1 year for us all and turns into a strong 2 year for me personally, which is supposed to be about connection. I look forward to it!

2025 reading list

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Here’s my 2025 reading list! It’s longer than I thought it would be, since I didn’t read much in the spring, summer, or even fall, it seemed. Summer is normally a big reading time for me, but my literacy energy this summer was mostly spent in writing. Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of my reading was that this was the year that I became obsessed with Moa Martinson. There are other treasures here as well…

  1. Farm-Raised Kids by Katie Kulla
  2. The Blue Fox by Sjón
  3. Paris: A Memoir by Paris Hilton
  4. Gathering Moss by Robin Wall Kimmerer
  5. Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
  6. Dear Girls by Ali Wong
  7. Making Love with the Land by Joshua Whitehead
  8. Love, Pamela by Pamela Anderson
  9. Atomic Habits by James Clear
  10. My Mother Gets Married by Moa Martinson
  11. On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
  12. I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman
  13. There There by Tommy Orange
  14. I’ll Tell You in Person by Chloe Caldwell
  15. Women by Chloe Caldwell
  16. Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
  17. In Pieces by Sally Field
  18. Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro
  19. Through the Children’s Gate by Adam Gopnik
  20. Little Weirds by Jenny Slate
  21. Women and Appletrees by Moa Martinson
  22. I Like to Watch by Emily Nussbaum
  23. Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight by Alexandra Fuller
  24. The Best American Short Stories 2024
  25. Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss by Margaret Renkl
  26. Women We Buried, Women We Burned by Rachel Louise Snyder
  27. How Should a Person Be? by Sheila Heti
  28. The Goodbye Kit by Daneen Bergland
  29. Spiral Staircase: A Meditation on Alchemy by Alyssa Spungen
  30. The 5 Types of Wealth by Sahil Bloom
  31. The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort To Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self by Michael Easter
  32. Audition by Katie Kitamura
  33. If You’re Seeing This It’s Meant for You by Leigh Stein
  34. Surviving Autocracy by Masha Gessen
  35. The Deep Places by Ross Douthat
  36. Mindset by Carol Dweck
  37. Who Is Government? by Michael Lewis (et al)
  38. The Forever Colony by Victor Villanueva
  39. Rosarita by Anita Desai
  40. Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson
  41. If You Don’t Like This, I Will Die by Lee Tilghman
  42. The Siren’s Call by Chris Hayes
  43. Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemma by Claire Dederer
  44. A Mountain to the North, a Lake to the South, Paths to the West, a River to the East by László Krasznahorkai
  45. Dare to Lead by Brené Brown
  46. The Witch’s Trinity by Erika Mailman
  47. Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
my 2025 booklist from Goodreads

The Witch’s Trinity by Erika Mailman

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My research has recently lead me to the learn more about the horrendous witch hunts that took place, especially in Europe, circa 1400-1700s and about the book that was used for those persecutions, the Malleus Maleficarum. That research process lead me to read Erika Mailman’s book, The Witch’s Trinity. The book is not my typical genre, but it was an engaging read that helped inform my understanding of that time in history. Here are a few things that stood out:

Mailman’s scene setting in the book was phenomenal. The consistent tone and language throughout was effective. The details of village life and the beliefs of the time were captivating and really helped set the scene for the terrifying witch hunts of that time.

The book takes place in a village that is experiencing famine, and the reader can easily see how the intensity of starvation completely skews people’s ability to think straight, to be reasonable, or to act with justice. I also recently learned that people with anorexia begin to loose their reasoning abilities due to lack of calories, and that lack of reasoning only exacerbates the problem. So too could I see the role of starvation and suffering in the witch hunt accusations.

Next, in reading this book, and having recently reading through the Malleus Maleficarum, I was struck by just how dangerous these books can be, how dangerous it can be to so completely trust a perspective or an interpretation that disadvantages and even outwardly harms certain individuals. As I read, I thought of all of the good people I know who might be accused just because of their differences. In the end, nobody is except from the dangerous mob mentality that can plague human thinking.

The Witch’s Trinity is an engaging, plot driven book that is expertly told by the author. It’s an interesting read for those interested in this place, time, and circumstances.

A Mountain to the North, a Lake to the South, Paths to the West, a River to the East by László Krasznahorkai

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Like the long title, this book is full of long passages, sentences that are entire paragraphs long. Entire chapters, in fact! A Mountain to the North, a Lake to the South, Paths to the West, a River to the East by László Krasznahorkai is a strange and fascinating medication on obsession, focus–deep, deep focus–of the absurdity, of the pain and beauty of life. Big stuff.

Krasznahorkai won the Nobel Prize in literature this year, and so I grabbed this book to see what he was all about. The deep descriptions in this book is what does it, I think. Krasznahorkai pairs deep description with complete control and poetry on the line level, informs, and conveys to readers some deeper understanding of the human psyche than they otherwise would have known. Yes, Krasznahorkai wins this award.

If You Don’t Like This, I Will Die by Lee Tilghman

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When Lee Tilghman’s followers said she was problematic, out of touch, too privileged– that she should be cancelled–she responded with her book, If You Don’t Like This, I Will Die, where she basically says, “Yes, I am, and you don’t even know the half of it.”

What follows is a behind the scenes look at the life of an “influencer.” Most people follow influencers, and Tilghman offers a behind the scenes look at the work, the lifestyle, and the mental sacrifice that can go into that world. Things are definitely not what they seem. Tilghman’s book highlights just how all consuming social media is–from excessive time, to resources, and to our attention too, of course. Posting became her entire life. She saw everything from the perspective of a post, and she worked very hard at it constantly. But she was so focused that she could not enjoy regular life.

Many people say that social media makes people sad because it makes them feel fomo. I do not experience that. However, I do experience the time suck that is synonymous with social media usage.

I paired this reading with Chris Hayes’s The Sirens’ Call, a book about the attention economy, and they work really well together! I recommend!

Rosarita by Anita Desai

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Rosarita by Anita Desai is a book for literary readers who want to spend some more mental energy in the beautiful cities of Mexico. Decades have passed now since I spent a summer traveling through Mexico on a trip with my school, but this book brought back that wonderful sense of travel–the unique sights and sounds that can only be experienced by being in Mexico, as an outsider perhaps. Readers who do not have the same connect to the country will still enjoy the prose, the rich description, and the strange emotional journey of our main character.

The Forever Colony by Victor Villanueva

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I enjoyed The Forever Colony by Victor Villanueva tremendously. The book does the work of reclamation history and offers lovely prose and theory and magical realism. I was reminded of The Lost Journals of Sacajewea by Debra Magpie Earling, which does something similar, imho.

If You’re Seeing This It’s Meant for You by Leigh Stein

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If you’ve found my corner of the internet, then you’ve likely found other odd little corners of the internet too, and that means Leigh Stein in If You’re Seeing This It’s Meant for You is going to sling some references your way that will feel intimate and weird and odd to be known, but also you will feel seen.

It’s a 21st century gothic novel, and definitely outside of my normal wheelhouse, but so far I’m liking everything by Leigh Stein, so to you I’d say, trust the process. This book has great, knowable characters, and the setting is a place where readers will want to spend some time.

In her bio, Stein writes that she “makes fun of the internet,” and she does. But I think her work goes much deeper than that too. There is some great social commentary, and the themes feel like they could sustain a level of inquiry that you find in a college classroom. Yes, I think you could teach this novel!

Audition by Katie Kitamura

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This is the first book I’ve read by Katie Kitamura, and I thought it was great! This is a 2025 release. I rarely read brand new books. In fact, this might be the only 2025 release on my reading list this year.

Audition is a very concept-y book. I assume this is Kitamura’s “thing” because it’s quite unique–this specific type of concept-driven prose, I mean–but can’t say for sure since I haven’t read her other works yet.

The book is, without doubt, very carefully and artfully written. The pacing is like a dictionary, and yet the characters all feel very human and knowable. The book’s takeaways and insights, always shown with subtlety, are profound.

Spiral Staircase: A Meditation on Alchemy by Alyssa Spungen

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Normally I post these books in the order that I complete them, but looking back through my notes, it appears that I didn’t get around to posting about this one, which I also read this summer.

I initially bought Spiral Staircase: A Meditation on Alchemy by Alyssa Spungen because the publisher, White Stag Publishing, is just so intriguing. They are an indy press that specializes in the spooky, mystical, spiritual realm, but with literary quality. (This combo is RARE!) They also offer kits that go along with the books, which include things like candles, tokens, and charms that all align in some thematic way with each individual book.

This book, and the kit that came with it, offered such a lovely and meditative experience. The whole thing kind of felt like a spa day–to open a package, light a candle, look through the little treats, and then read a book of poetry. It was a unique experience, but one I would definitely treat myself to regularly whenever the press publishes works that catch my eye. Spiral Staircase is a beautifully woven tapestry of poetry with themes of spiritual alchemy artfully tied in throughout.