Weekend Bookshelf

Posted on September 9, 2018 by John Kevin Hickey

     I never feel lonely if I’ve got a book – they’re like old friends. Even if you’re not reading them over and over again, you know they are there. And they’re part of your history. They sort of tell a story about your journey through life.

                                                                                                      Emilia Fox

     The Weekend Bookshelf is a bit truncated this week.  With the late summer temperatures having moderated (a nice way of saying I don’t develop an instant case of swamp-ass when I step outside), I have been spending more time doing outdoor activities than writing.  Riding my bicycle, pulling weeds in my garden and lounging in the hammock have filled up my days when I’m not at work.  Got to enjoy these last warm days before the dark times arrive.

     Speaking of the hammock, Mrs. Vintage has recently discovered the joys of reading whilst relaxing in the hammock.  One day last week texted me a selfie of her enjoying a book in the hammock while I was at work.  That’s just wrong!

ON THE NIGHTSTAND

     My plan to read at least twenty-five pages a day has been progressing well.  I accomplished this herculean task 6 out the last 7 days.  I finished the fifth book of the Expanse series, “Nemesis Games”, in less than a week.  Very enjoyable read, but my review of it will come another day.  Right now I am about 1/3 of the way through Nick Bunker’s “Empire on the Edge”.  I hope to review it next week.

FROM THE BOOKSHELF

     Giving our children the love of reading is perhaps one of the greatest gifts a parent can bestow upon their children.  It gives our off-spring access to a lifetime of adventure and knowledge.  I am so proud that my daughter and son-in-law are now giving the gift of reading to their own son.

     My grandson already has several favorite books, including “The Wheels on the Bus”, “Ten Little Pigs” and “Brown Bear, Brown Bear what do you see?”.  A young man of very discerning tastes.

     Earlier this summer Mrs. Vintage and I sent our grandson a seasonal pop-up book by Dale A. Carter called, appropriately enough, “Summer”.   The boy loved it so much he mangled it.  Now with autumn rapidly approaching, we felt it was time to purchase some fall specific reading materials for him.

     Autumn, also by Dale A. Carter, is a pop-up book of what one might see on a brisk autumn day, including pumpkins, alto-cumulus clouds and moose!

 

Pop-up Peekaboo! Pumpkin has Halloween scares under every flap.

 

Finally, from the team that brought you “If You Give A Mouse a Cookie, comes It’s Pumpkin Day, Mouse!, where our intrepid little mouse decorates his pumpkins for Halloween.

 

     What is your favorite autumn themed kids book?

     Tips, comments, recommendations, and suggestions are always welcome.  Have a great week!

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Bicycling and mindfulness

Posted on September 6, 2018 by John Kevin Hickey

     Mindfulness has become all the rage these days and with good reason.  Mindfulness is an effective way of handling everyday stress, insomnia or for general relaxation.  But for those who suffer anxiety and/or depression, mindfulness can be a powerful tool to help manage their affliction.  Mindfulness can help the sufferers reduce their symptoms and allow them to live fuller lives.

     Before we get into what mindfulness is, let us discuss what mindfulness isn’t.  When I first started practicing mindfulness, I thought the goal was to completely stop the thoughts that were constantly coursing through my brain.  I believed I needed to empty my head.  (Yes, I know, many of you think that I have been empty-headed for many years).

     That is not how one practices mindfulness.  Instead, mindfulness is nudging the brain to shift its focus from conscious thinking to simply being in the moment.  It’s nearly impossible to stop the brain from problem solving, but with practice and patience, you can train it to quiet down and for a short while simply be.

   One of the most common methods of mindfulness is to simply focus on breathing.  That’s it.  Simply breathe in and out slowly, and focus on your chest rising and falling.  Whenever a thought intrudes, you become aware of it and let it drift away and return to your breathing.  That is just one method, there are many others. Prayer, for example, can be a form of mindfulness.

     An effective way to learn mindfulness is to download an a guided meditation app onto your phone or other electronics.  There are many apps to choose from.  I used to have an app called “Calm” on my Nook that guided me through the mindfulness process, but when the app owner jacked the price up 100% I deleted it.  Admittedly, the price only went from $2.00 to $4.00, but that’s some serious inflation.

     Since then I have used YouTube to find guided meditations.  My favorites are produced by The Honest Guys.  Good stuff.  See here for an example:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p_yaNFSYao

     Usually when practicing mindfulness one sits or lays down in a comfortable position, closes one’s eyes and begins to focus on being in the moment.  But you don’t have to be motionless when being mindful.  Which brings us to the point of this post.  We can use exercise, specifically bicycling in this case, as a form of mindfulness.  It’s actually very easy to do.  To start with, when you are bicycling you are already in a basic form of mindfulness.  After all, you have be aware of your surroundings and the road in front of you to avoid falls or collisions.  You are already in the moment.

Example of NOT being mindful.

     From there, you just need to focus the rest of your attention on something that will quiet the voice inside you head.  Perhaps notice your breathing and how it changes as the ride progresses; or the cadence of your legs as you pedal.

     My technique is to focus on the passing landscape and observing the world around me.  What plants are in bloom (right now it’s Apache Plume and asters), or the wind shaking the leaves of the trees.

     While I’m riding I try to engage four of the five senses: the feel of my legs powering me up a hill or the warmth of the sun on my back; the sounds of my tires hissing on the asphalt or the songs of the birds, the smell of decomposing leaves from a nearby forest in autumn; seeing the wind tossing grass plumes to-and-fro in late summer.

     I suppose I might include taste if I happen to swallow a bug or something.

     Mindfulness is a skill.  Like any other skill it requires practice and consistency to reap its benefits.  Whether one is sitting on a cushion listening to calming music or bombing down a hill on a bicycle, the point is to fit mindfulness into our lives, and for a little while just live in the moment and let our worries take a break.

     See you all out on the bike paths.

 

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Weekend Bookshelf 03 September 18

Posted on September 2, 2018 by John Kevin Hickey

 

“You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.” 

                                                                                                         Ray Bradbury

     Several studies have come out over the past few years that indicate that the way we browse the internet is changing what and how we read. (see here, here and here).

     In fact, internet surfing may be physically changing the very structure of our brains!

     Reading is a skill, and like any skill our ability to effectively read can get rusty with lack of use.  Especially deep reading. Deep reading is the deliberate reading of text for information or enjoyment purposes.  Deep reading requires focus and comprehension.  When we read information on the internet, on the other hand, we generally just skim over the text and pick up bits and pieces of what the article is trying to convey.

     One theory holds that when we surf the internet we are hunting for small bits of information.  When we find information that pleases us, we get a little dopamine release as a reward.  Dopamine is the “pleasure” chemical in our brains.  Like addicts, we then continue to hunt for more tiny bits of information so we can get more dopamine hits.

     This in turn causes us to be easily distracted when trying to read something that is longer than a few sentences.  There is even an acronym that I have come across on other blogs:  tl;dr.  It means “too long; didn’t read”.  (I should note that to keep my own blog posts interesting and readable, I try to keep the word count somewhere between 250-500 words).  We are losing the ability to perform deep reading.

     Some educators worry that children born today won’t be able to read books at all!

     I am forced to admit to being an internet dopamine addict as well.  Even as I was typing this post I would periodically stop so I could check out some webpage that apparently needed my immediate attention, lest the world stop spinning on its axis.

     This behavior has affected my own reading habits, and I am endeavoring to change this.  I’ve read several articles on ways to relearn reading, and I’ve come across a method that I think might work for me.  I will read 25 pages each and every day.  I started this plan last night, and managed to get through 10 whole pages before I grabbed my Nook and started surfing the web.  Looks like there might be more work ahead of me than I thought!

FROM THE NIGHTSTAND

     In my younger days I was a hardcore science fiction and fantasy fanatic.  It was practically the only genre I read.  Tolkien, Burroughs, Asimov, Heinlein, Herbert, et al, I read them all.

     When I got to my mid-20’s, I finally began to branch out into other subjects and genres.  I continued to read sci-fi and fantasy, but I started to be a little more selective in my choices as I found a lot of the field is just plain crap.

     By the time I reached my 30’s I was down to reading just one fantasy series: The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan.  The first 4 or 5 books in the series were outstanding, but Jordan kept adding more and more novels to his epic until I finally gave up after book nine.  (A lot of modern fantasy authors seem to be trying to outdo Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy by writing these sprawling sagas that never seem to end.  Robert Jordan died before he finished his series and the publisher had to hire another writer to finish it out).

     Recently, while looking for something new to read, I spotted on my Goodreads recommendation page a space opera series called “The Expanse”.  I was a little hesitant to take up another science fiction series, but it was highly rated by the majority of the reviewers and it did sound kind of fun.  So I purchased the first book in the series, “Leviathan Wakes”, and am I glad that I did!

     “Leviathan Wakes” is a fun, fast paced and rollicking adventure story set in our solar system a couple of centuries from now.  While the authors (James S.A. Corey is a pseudonym for Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck) take great pains to realistically portray living and traveling in space, they never let the technical aspect take center stage.  Instead, they focus on interesting characters and a tightly written plot.  That’s ok, I guess, if you’re into that sort of thing.

     “Leviathan Wakes” follows the adventures of a small band of beleaguered heroes fighting pirates, space detectives, shadowy corporations, a solar system on the brink of a civil war, and an ancient alien molecule that may either give humanity the stars or end us once and for all.

     “Leviathan Wakes” is a fun and exciting read and I heartily give it 4 thumbs up!

                                           

ON THE BOOKSHELF

     Kit Carson was a fascinating and complex individual.  Mountain man, guide for John C. Fremont’s western expeditions, famed Indian fighter, veteran of both the Mexican-American war and the American Civil War, an Army general and Indian agent.  Kit Carson was be a ruthless Indian fighter who is held responsible for the deaths of hundreds if not thousands of Apache and Navajo Native Americans.  Ironically, he eventually came to be the champion and defender of the Ute tribe.  As I said, a complex man.

     Thanks to a recommendation from a reader (a tip of the cap to Patrick B. for the suggestion!), my next book purchase is going to be “Blood and Thunder: The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West” by Hampton Sides.

     Tips, suggestions, recommendations and comments are always welcome.  Have a great week!

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