Reading contract

We had "reading contracts" in elementary. My first and not last experiences with lying. I sold my soul for a free personal pan pizza from Pizza Hut. The day before it was due I would fish it out of my back pack, all crumpled and torn and write down all kinds of fake numbers. There was no way I was going to forfeit that pizza prize!! I can still remember the layout and the smell of that Pizza Hut we went to on university ave. I was suppose to read a certain amount each week and I probably really did read that much...I liked to read. I just didn't like tracking it everyday...and so it went throughout my schooling...jumping through hoops to get what I wanted without doing the work. I did eventually figure out, half way thru college, that learning isn't so bad, and can even be enjoyable. I didn't become a family SCIENTIST without having to know my stuff, sheesh! I turned right out ok? I mean...ok so I still sometimes try to get stuff for free...like the carpet cleaning incident and the fire safety dinner disaster. Live and learn. Anyway I am trying to console myself by admitting that I wasn't a sterling scholar kinda gal, not every mother's dream daughter (as far as excelling in my studies goes) but I somehow got a college degree and married a heck of a husband and have some fantastic kids to boot. And what do you know I read, bring it reading contract...

Half broke Horses by Jeanette Walls. LOVED this book. I haven't read her first and bestselling prequel, Glass Castle all the way through yet...I am working on it. But I think this book is BETTER!! Its just feels so authentic to those early days of the west. And what it meant to rough it, I got a whole new insight about cowboys and education and on and on... I couldn't put it down.

The Sweet by and by. Good enough to get me to the end, but just barely. I don't know it was a little cliche and sappy for my liking...and contrived. But it had a good message.

Year of Wonders, by Geraldine Brooks. Really interesting read, and I really liked some of the authors insights about our relationship to God. It is based on an account from a village during the plague in the 1600. The village really existed and the book is taken from the records of the village. It was a really fascinating story about a time in history I didn't know much about. Made me grateful for modern medicines, among many other things.