Well, here we are again.
Is it just me, or did 2017 go past in a special kind of blur? I suspect a lot of us feel rather battered by the twelve months now drawing to a close. This year has been a challenging one in ways large and small for so many in our circle and beyond. That elusive “balance” which we strive for has been a hard thing to maintain, as the losses mount up and deep griefs are endured.
Personally speaking, I’m quietly joyful to be greeting the New Year tomorrow morning, though I suspect I will be in bed sleeping as the clock ticks over at midnight tonight. Which in itself will be a good thing, as sleep has often been elusive this past year, and starting 2018 well rested will surely be an auspicious thing!
I don’t generally do much in the way of making resolutions with the start of each new year, but it is nonetheless a time of reflection, and one tends to analyze what did and didn’t go as planned, and what one wishes one had done.
In relation to this blog, I do wish I had posted more often, as I genuinely miss the interaction with fellow readers of (mostly) older books. No promises, but instead a quiet “intention” to get on here more. Even if the posts are mere snippets, a sentence or two versus longer-winded essays, because I certainly do enjoy reading other people’s brief posts as much as I do their longer ones. And pictures are always a real pleasure to view, so I will try to share glimpses of my world a little more frequently.
Not sure if I can muster up a year-end book list to share – my reading year is also something of a blur! – but we’ll see what tomorrow brings, as I am likely to be enjoying a measure of solitude as my family will all be off elsewhere on New Year’s Day. They’ll be home in the evening, and that will be lovely, but earlier on there will be time for solitary reading and writing, and I may just have some thoughts to share.
I am reading my way into 2018 with an engaging bit of vintage literature, Elizabeth Bowen’s 1963 novel, The Little Girls.
I’m a Bowen neophyte, having sampled her on occasion but never quite being drawn in, but I’m well on my way with this one and enjoying it. It’s not nearly the nostalgically melancholic thing I thought it might be with its old-school-friends-meeting-after-many-years-apart theme; there’s instead a sardonic wryness going on which I am finding paradoxically appealing.
Shades of Rose Macaulay, perhaps? Another writer who must be tackled when the mood is just right, and when one has patience enough to slow down and savour the complexities of the writing. For so far I have been spending a fair bit of time re-reading sentences, as Bowen is a bit of a twisty writer, in a pleasurably artful sort of way.
I hope you have all been having a happy holiday season. Belated Merry Christmas to those of you who are of that faith and culture, and best wishes to everyone else at this time of contemplation and celebration as the year turns over with the Solstice. A full moon will be shining tonight, which seems a good omen for the year to come, lighting our way forward into the unknown.
Warm wishes from me to all of you, fellow readers. May 2018 bring you the best books and peaceful times to read them!
Leaves & Pages 
And best wishes to you, too! I hope 2018 is a better year for us all… 2017 was not a happy year for so many.
Best wishes for 2018. 2017 went by in a flash and it has been a horrible year in the UK with all the political mayhem.
I love your photographs.
Adding my wishes for all good things in 2018, particularly books.
I haven’t had the energy to do a “favorite books of 2017” list – but I’m hoping to post more regularly in 2018 (not quite a resolution, just a hope).
I’m encouraged to hear you’re enjoying the Bowen. Like you, I’ve tried her before without any fireworks going off but she’s one of those authors who I’m pretty sure I will like one day when the moon and stars and whatnot align properly. Glad to hear your moment of alignment has come!
Happy New Year and I hope 2018 brings only good things for you – and (selfishly, because I love to hear from you) more time to blog, however briefly.
I only like Bowen’s TO THE NORTH.Just could not get on with her other novels or stories.
Happy new year to you too! I’m very fond of Bowen – not always an easy read but so rewarding!
Best wishes for a happy year 2018!
It’s good to hear fom you again. I hope you enjoy Elizabeth Bowen. I haven’t read ‘The little girls’. But I remember that I greatly enjoyed an autobiographical piece in her collection ‘the Mulberry tree’
published by Virago. I tried one of her novels and didn’t get on with it. Perhaps I should give them another try.
May 2018 be a good year or you.
Happy New Year to all the Leaves and Pages community.
Happy New Year Barb and best wishes to you and yours – would be great to hear more from you in 2018!
Thank you for the kind wishes, Moira. And the same sentiments to you and yours. I hope 2018 is good to you!
I’ll see if I post more this coming year. I have recently been freed from some clerical duties with an organization I work with, leaving me with some discretionary keyboard time, as it were. And I was missing the ongoing conversations on this blog, so it’s so good to find that everyone is still very much here for me! I have been mostly lurking on other people’s blogs; enjoying them greatly but not commenting much. Which I hope to domore of as well in 2018.