2011: changes made, resolved or on accident

• Four big books read: Bone, Les Miserables, The Lord of the Rings, The Hunger Games Trilogy
• More cooking, thanks to being without a meal plan in Edinburgh. Learned recipes like coffee cake, pineapple teriyaki chicken, vegetarian fried rice, and pasta a-plenty.
• Exercise innovations: barefoot running, kettlebell routines, eschewing exercise machines.
• More non-school writing: journaling, a few attempts at stories, lots of articles in the Collegian.
• Random: studying standing up, throwing theme parties (CMA Awards Watch Party, Jay-Z’s birthday party), writing more music.

Reading

Katie has written eloquently about why she loves new year resolutions and how she makes hers: not an “an extensive list with lofty, impossible to achieve wishes,” but goals that are a product of reflection, appropriately done at a time of year when we stop and notice how things have changed (one year ago today, I landed in Edinburgh for a five-month adventure under the guise of “studying”).

Amy’s “Directions in Which to Lean in 2012” are not the kind of thing you have to do every day: eating less meat, watching less TV, beginning to compost, etc.

What daunted me about new year resolutions as a child and kept me from the practice was the notion that resolutions had to be made on 1 January, and if you didn’t stick to them every single day, you failed. Intimidated as I was by resolution-making, I stayed away from the business and missed out on what could have been some healthy introspection and intentional efforts at growth.

The reading challenges changed everything. With Amy & Katie, I read 52 books in the 52 weeks of 2010, and then four 1,000-page books in the four seasons of 2011. Finally—a resolution that I didn’t have to worry about every single day, and that I could gradually decide on as January went on. Plus, the books I read were generally rewarding, and there were several that I wouldn’t have read without the challenge (like Les Miserables, the only book that has ever made me cry).

So this year, I’ll be doing 12 in 12; I don’t know what its parameters are yet. Right now it’s 12 “substantial” or “worthy” books in 12 months. It remains to be decided whether or not I’ll introduce a floor on page numbers or genre-specific goals (e.g. 2 Christian, 2 economics, 1 biography, 1 mystery, 1 graphic novel, 1 Shakespeare, etc.). For now, I’ll be reading Jacob’s Room by Virginia Woolf with Annie Paige (it’s free for Kindle).

With 52 in 52 and 4 in 4, I never bothered with making sure that each book corresponded to a particular week or season. With 12 in 12, I will. That way I don’t get a bunch of reading done over spring break and then ditch books for a few months because I can.

I’m thinking about other “directions in which to lean in 2012”—I’ll post them once my thoughts have coalesced.

The fourth month draws to a close (by the way, make sure to listen to “April Anne” and “April Come She Will” while their titles are still so seasonally appropriate). We’re a third of the way through the year. This has been no cruel April for me—I traveled and wrote a paper I was proud of and did loads of reading. So much, in fact, that I’ve just finished my third 1,000+ page book, The Lord of the Rings (1,069 pages). Now, I realize that 4 in 4 is supposed to be 4 millepaginal books in the 4 seasons of the year, and that finishing two such books in springtime (in the same month, no less!) slightly contravenes the letter of the challenge.

But c’mon. I’m going to be a camp counselor (almost) all summer. Last year from the start of week 1 to the end of week 8, the only books I finished were Chronicles of Narnia books that I read to my campers at nap time and bedtime (this year I might try Pligrim’s Progress!). I think I can be forgiven for working ahead.

Especially since I’m hoping to make Man, Economy, and State (with Power and Market) by Murray Rothbard my fourth book. This one will be a bit denser than a graphic novel, fantasy epic, or even the masterpiece of French literature. I’ve already read about two or three hundred pages of it, but it’s been nearly a year now and I’ll probably have to start over. The good news is that while the whole book is 1,440 pages, the last bit—Power and Market— was not originally published along with the first bit, as Rothbard had intended. Man, Economy, and State by itself is just shy of 1,100 pages, which gives me some breathing room if December comes and I’ve still got miles to go.

In related news, I also finished Anarchism: A Very Short Introduction by Colin Ward (98 small pages) and King’s Cross by Tim Keller (238 pages), meaning that this April has probably been about my most productive month ever in terms of reading. My May book might be Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, or I could get back to reading Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes, which I haven’t picked up in a while.

Since I last posted about this year’s reading challenge, I’ve decided that the official goal this year is “4 in 4”—four books of over 1000 pages in the 4 seasons of the year. So far:

1. Winter: Bone by Jeff Smith, 1332 pages, finished on 13 January. This graphic novel, besides being full of characters that are sympathetic, and funny, and flawed, and heroic, and petty, and eminently likeable, does a fantastic job with scale. The book is an Epic, there’s no doubt about that, but it starts off so small and whimsical that by the time you’re finished, you appreciate how much bigger than you ever imagined the story became. Definitely the easiest thousand-page book I’ve ever read. 
2. Spring: Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, 1330 pages, finished on 11 April. When I was 12 or 13, I read an abridged version of this story, which I loved because of the musical, that was about 550 pages. Stories about the dauntingly long detours about Waterloo and Parisian sewers scared me away from reading the unabridged version until this challenge got me to do it. I started on March 23 (reading the recent Julie Rose translation), but did the bulk of the reading on the Trip of a Life, finally finishing on a terrace at a restaurant in Marrakesh. I have never cried while reading a book or watching a movie, but I cried at the end of Les Miserables. I felt lost for the next few days; I was with Tim and Ben, but had said goodbye to my third traveling companion.
   Anyway, it’s the best novel I’ve ever read, and I even loved the parts about Waterloo and the sewers. It didn’t hurt that I read the chapter about Waterloo in a city that still has statues of Napoleon (Paris). 
3. Summer: I’m more than halfway through The Lord of the Rings, and I don’t know if I’ll get it finished before summer starts or not. I’m in no hurry. Reading it in Great Britain has been wonderful; it makes every castle and glen seem that much more magical.
4. Winter: Maybe Man, Economy, and State (with Power & Market) by Murray Rothbard. I need to read it at some point, and honestly, the challenge is the likeliest thing to ever motivate me to actually finish an economics treatise of more than 1400 pages.

Other books that I’ve read this year:

• The Art of Manliness by Brett and Kate McKay, 274 pages
• True Grit by Charles Portis, 215 pages
• All-Star Superman by Grant Morrison, 308 pages
• Generous Justice by Tim Keller, 230 pages
• Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream by H.G. Bissinger, 367 pages
• Austrian Macroeconomics: A Diagrammatical Exposition by Roger W. Garrison, 36 pages
• The Trip of a Life by James Lepine, 105 pages

I might end up doing the 12 and 12 Challenge with my sisters and mom alongside the 4 in 4 Challenge. If so, January’s book is True Grit, February’s is The Fellowship of the Ring, March’s is Friday Night Lights, and April’s is Les Miserables.