Shaina Reads

I'm officially a quarter of a century old, and my birthday weekend was a smashing success. I ate and drank many wonderful things (including this carrot cake) and spent a lot of quality time with friends. Mostly important, I did not get trapped on a space station for the rest of my life—my group and I made it out with four minutes to spare! If any of you are puzzle fiends and have the opportunity to try out an escape room, I highly recommend it.


I also got some birthday books, because this blog has not in fact devolved to a mere journal about my life (yet). I patronized a good ol' local, independent bookstore and walked away with Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond and The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood. The latter in particular was eluding me at the library. I could not be more excited to read both of them.

A photo posted by Shaina (@shainareadsbooks) on Jul 10, 2016 at 11:57am PDT

Things are still slow on the reading front overall, but I am about halfway through God Help the Child by Toni Morrison. It's short, clocking in at just 179 pages. If you've read any Morrison, you know why I'm taking my time with each and every page. I'm not loving it as much as I've loved her past work so far, but I'm reserving my final judgment until the end.

Hi, guys. In case you hadn't noticed, I have not been blogging. Not a darned word! In fact, I haven't even been reading all that much since July began. Gasp.

Here's a handy-dandy list of what I've been doing instead:

Gamifying my life with Habitica.

Consuming more media.

Aging.

I turn 25 tomorrow. Two very good friends from college are coming up from New York to celebrate, and I'll be locking them in a room with some local friends and forcing everyone to problem-solve until we can escape. (I love nothing more than a good puzzle, particularly a puzzle that involves BEING ON A SPACE STATION.) I'm sure there will be further festivities involving food and alcohol, given that we don't end up locked on the space station forever.

I have a very good feeling about my twenty-sixth year. Big changes are coming, changes that will be actively catapulting me toward the life I want and the person I want to be. It's cliché to say it, but I can't remember a time in my life when I've felt so much like I'm on the right path (hence the photo accompanying today's post). It's terrifying, of course—change and I don't always mesh well—but the terror is tempered by healthy doses of anticipation, of eagerness to get started, and of certainty that I'll be able to handle whatever comes. I'll ride the highs, I'll weather the lows, and I'll keep on fighting to milk the most that I can out of this thing called life.