On the Table
Rebecca just threw down the gauntlet. We were “talking” on IM when she suggested blogging everything on our bedside table, just for a lark. She says she’ll do it if I’ll do it, but I can’t cheat. By this I assume she means I can’t take stuff out that makes me look shallow or add stuff in that makes me seem deeper than I really am…or maybe she just means I can’t lie and say I have less stacked up there than I really do. So here’s my list, no cheating involved.
Lying (or is it Laying?) on the bedside table:
The Artist’s Way
Julia Cameron
-and my really cool journal for morning pages which I should scan in and show you. I made it last night at Monkfish…this was after we did yoga while Eden ran around with a rainbow dancer. (There. Now you either wish you lived here or are desperately grateful that you are many, MANY states away.)
From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
E.L. Konigsberg
-a great kids book about two runaway kids who live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Charlie and the Chocloate Factory
Roald Dahl
-to be made even yummier by Johnny Depp in just 7 days!
The Book of Salt
Monique Truong
-which I got for Paul, but he didn’t get into it so now it’s MINE!
Blackberry Wine
Joanne Harris
-my new favorite Summer author
Plain Text
Nancy Mairs
-because Lauren Winner suggested I read it and I thought it would help me prepare to write some personal essays for possible publishing. But really, it just stressed me out so I haven’t opened it.
Running with Scissors
Augusten Burroughs
-which I don’t like. it’s too “oh, look at me I’m so clever and damaged”…so I’m not going to finish it, even though it’s widly popular. As Matt Blackwell Kinney once said: “Life is too short for books you don’t like.”
The Pilot’s Wife
Anita Shreve
-I bought two books by this author at bookstore closeout last year. I didn’t like the first one I read, so I thought I’d re-sell this one. Alas, no one will take it. I’d rather give it a shot than dump it in the donation heap at Half Price Books, so here it sit again, reprived for now.
Pebble Mosaics
Schneebeli-Morrell and Nicol
Modern Mosaic
Tessa Hunkin
Standing on the bedside table:
Okay, those are the ones lying on my bedside table. Which means I’m actually dabbling in each of them. But I also have a little teak book holder thinging in which I cache the “I’m gonna read these real soon” stack.
Three Zines: Hip Mama, Bitch, and BrainChild
-because jen told me i should write something for them
The Celtic Way of Evangelism
George S. Hunter
-because Charles asked me if we had a steeple at the abbey.
Plan B
Anne Lamott
-wait! what’s that doing there and why the heck haven’t i finished it?! what was i thinking?!?!? I must have put it there in a frenzy of cleaning!
The Message
-it’s there all the time for those mornings when I need it.
How Much Does your Soul Weigh: Diet-Free Solutions to your Food, Weight, and Body Worries
Dorie McCubbrey
-okay, so that’s a little embarassing. self help books! seesh!
Blink
Malcom Gladwell
-because Tipping Point was so fucking brilliant and because I’m hoping Blink encourages intuitive ways of knowing
A String and a Prayer
Wiley & Ohan Shannon
-I’ve actually read most of this one but I’m keeping it here to remind myself to ask my bead-artist neighbor Pamm to help me make some children’s prayer beads for Eden
Bird by Bird
Anne Lamott
-because, you know, i keep thinking i might want to be a writer.. and it’s ANNE!
Other Stuff on the table:
-my little She altar
- a hammered tin mirror my parents brought me from mexico
-an alarm clock which i never set
-a green glass candle my Rose gave me on my birthday
-a love note from jen
-a one braclet
-a basket with the essentials: more prayer beads, matches, a foot file, peppermint & plum foot cream, Burt’s Bees almond milk hand cream, Burts Bees lip balm in several flavors, a nail file, nail buffer, tiger balm, ear plugs (paul snores), a couple of pens, the bag and background note that came with my greek dolly, and various hair pins and rubber bands.
So now you know folks. You can all rest easy and more enlightened.
Post your own list and link it in my comments with trackback or however that works. (I don’t get this technical stuff. Paul was amazed that I knew what was “Snipe” was and that I used the term “avatar” — but I can’t do a trackback to save my life.)
Happy Friday!
wow. cool list rachelle!
i posted a picture on my site instead of making a list, mostly because my list was kind of pathetic.
You must have a really big bedside table….
I have a clock, some lotion, also some Burts Bee products , Vicks vapor rub, Icy Hot muscle rub, and I think that is about it.
Bedroom meme
Get your mind out of the gutter! Rachelle appears to have started a new meme: listing whatever is on your bedside table. I found this to be most interesting because I never really think about what’s on my bedside table.
Actually, I was grateful to be given a reason to truly look at my bedside table and see the archeology of my night time reading. Plus, I avoided an overdue charge at the library by rediscovering Joe Jones (by Anne Lamott)! Thanks, Rachelle!
I’m pretty excited about some of these books you mentioned. You DO have a big bedside table.
alas! a bedside table? where is that? where is the box of stuff that is labeled bedside table???
Hey Rachelle,
Thanks for the idea….
Jennifer
Oh. and it’s “lying”, not “laying”. Something is “lying” on something else when it is merely there. Something is “laying” on something when it is being put there by, say, a human. “Laying” is an active verb and requires an agent of action–in this case, you.
So: Lying on my night table..
and
I lay the following on my night table…
Hope this is clear. I am an adult literacy instructor in 9-5 life, and it sometimes surfaces in strange places…
Can’t do my bedside table now, but wanted to encourage you - when you’re feeling stronger - on the Nancy Mairs. She’s just great - her work has meant the world to me. But it can be really heartbreaking. So seriously - when you’re feeling stronger.
I also didn’t like ‘running with scissors’, though there’s a really good essay in one of this more recent books - not ‘dry’, the third one - about his brother.
A. Burroughs is no D. Sedaris.
Yeah, dump “running with” but leaf through “magical thinking”. It’s better (mho.)
oh so glad that someone has a bedside table spilling over like mine…would have to include the little pile that sits on the floor right in front of it, as that is where half of it lands ;D
hmmm, maybe i’ll switch to a low bookshelf for a great bedside table…