whatcha readin'? {goal 48 - book 13} 📖

This one is definitely a re-read for me.
I have read all of these books so many times
over the years, I have completely lost count.

I devoured this one weekend when I thought
I screwed up my back again…
so I lost myself in the land of Anne.
Picnics, antics of Davey & Dora,
big decisions, amusing predicaments
and, of course, Gilbert. ♥

I will never not love these books.
They transport me immediately
to my childhood, to laying upside down
on an arm chair,
eating apples,
with nothing else to do
except read all day long.

My dad once told me that
one of his favorite memories
was that when I was a kid,
I would come out to the shed
where he worked, way before the big garage…
but the shed where he worked on
snowmobiles and dirt bikes,
built windmills and ice boats…
and I would sit silently on the steps to the loft
and read while he worked,
neither of us talking
but it was just enough
to be in close proximity of him.

I think of that
and I think of him remembering that
and it gives me a
glowworm in my heart.
I was loved. I loved and was loved.
They might not be here now…
but that love remains.

I got sidetracked. Sorry, Lucy Maud. 🤭

“I like to fancy souls as being made of light. And some are all shot through with rosy stains and quivers…and some have a soft glitter like moonlight on the sea…and some are pale and transparent like mist at dawn…”

This makes me happy now in a way
I would have not understood when I was a kid
or even 5 years ago.
But I understand it now.

Also not to make this way too long
but can we just take a second to
admire these BEAUTIFUL FRIGGING COVERS?
This series is done by Ellie McKay
and I am in love and going to get the whole series.
These are definitely keepers for me.

💙💙💙💙💙’s out of 5

NEXT UP: WRITERS & LOVERS - Lily King

so long 2025....

It’s been a while since I have
been here…
it’s not that I haven’t thought about it,
words whispering in my ear
when I am busy doing something else
but then when I think
I should sit down and write,
my brain goes blank
because nothing seems right….
in any or every way.

Loss is such a complicated mixed up place to be.
It is messy and uncharted…there is no map.
There is no key. No compass.
Because in it, you feel like you are flying blind,
every hairpin turn is unexpected,
some of the small hills end with a cliff…
the road signs are mixed up and meaningless.

So when it feels like you don’t know
which way you are going,
you are right.
You probably don’t know which way you are going.
Oh, and did I mention the fog?

I am hesitant on one hand
to say goodbye to 2025.
It is the last year I had my mom.
But also I hate 2025…
it is the year I lost my mom.

Goodbye 2025.
Some very good things happened this year
but they are gravely overshadowed by
The One Fucking Very Bad Thing
that happened this year.

I want to write about the happy things,
the trips, the time spent with family and friends,
the love, the laughter, the adventures
but
I can’t yet.
But I will.
Because I know what Mom would say.

and I take comfort in the one thing that I can.
They are together. They are together. They are together.

So, once again, this is not what I came here to say
but this is what came out
and so I will leave it at that.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you.
I wish all the best of things for us all
and an amazing, healing, happy 2026…
and if you are also trying to navigate this
land of loss and heartache, just know
you are not the only one flailing around in the fog…
and hoping that it will lift soon,
let a little sunshine back in.
💙💙💙

the truth is...

I feel lost in the land of in-between.
I am trying to make sense
of life without my mom…
while still processing life without my dad…

The strange thing about loss…
loss so big and gaping and bloody
that sometimes
I feel like my insides
must be on the outside,
that I must be dragging my
broken cracked heart behind me
by a vein…
there is no way all of this is happening
inside of me…
but the strange thing is
regular life keeps moving.

And you have to, too.

And you know this…you know you do.
You know why you know?
Because after dad, your mom sat you down
and said “you have to get back out there,
you have to go on adventures, you have to do silly things,
dad wouldn’t want this, dad loved your adventures.”

So I did.
Even when my heart wasn’t in it, I did it
because I didn’t want mom to worry about me.

But there is no one here now to tell me that now.
No one that I would listen to.
The logical side of my brain tells me
what mom would say
but the illogical side of my brain is louder
right now. It won’t always be.
But right now, it’s winning.

All this to say, that I am going to try.
To accept joy, to find my spark,
to live the life I have left
with wonder and excitement and silliness
alongside the memories and the
moments of heartbreaking sadness/loneliness/grief…
I will try…so mom doesn’t worry about me.

sundays

the truth is
sundays
will now always be
the hardest
of the days.
not only because
we lost you on a
sunday
but
because
sundays
were always
"out home"
days…
mom and dad days…
and then just mom days
and now…
i don’t know what to
do
with myself
on sundays…
the hardest of the days.

trying...💔

I’m trying. It’s been 3 weeks. Soon to be 4.
When do I stop counting, marking the days, the hours.
I keep thinking I have to remember to tell her,
to call her, that she’ll laugh when I say this…
and then I remember. So I’m trying.

Trying to find the words.
Trying to find the reason.
Trying to find the light.
Trying to find the hope…
the laughter…the joy…

It all feels muted though…
and gray.
No color, no light.
Sunshine and no sun.
……………………………………..

It is a strange business
this enterprise called grief.
It is both numbing
and also roughshod rumbling tumbling like rocks in my heart
and then all of a sudden
it eats you up
in one gulp
without chewing hard enough
to kill you
but just hard enough to make
you feel the pain of your
empty bones being
crunched
your now hollow heart
gnawed upon…
teeth marks on your soul
and then —
it spits you out.

Sweaty and salty and slick with tears
but it taunts and promises of its non-negotiable fucking return
because we are not done yet
it whispers and then it
slithers away
It sinks into the shade and waits.
For the lull of normality.
It waits.