Ninety minutes

I have to "Thank" Quilt Pixie for telling me about the book How to Live on 24 Hours a Day by Arnold Bennett. Available to read online or download at Project Gutenberg. There's also a summary of the book on Wikipedia - here. It's a very quick read, so I did. I'm going to give Bennett's recommendation a shot and take ninety minutes every other evening in "some important and consecutive cultivation of the mind."

This kind of thing really appeals to me, although every other day for ninety minutes may challenge my "regular recurring idleness" but that's the point! I've been wanting to explore Italian Operas so I'm going to start with La Traviata. More in depth than what's written on Wikipedia (here) and hopefully I'll be able to understand the Italian. I haven't told my husband yet but my reward will be that he gets to take me to the opera. (Imagine his surprise!) The Portland Opera just happens to be doing both La Traviata and Rigoletto this season.

Hopefully, he'll be as excited as I am. (I'm thinking I may need to bribe him with a really nice dinner out!)


Living consciously...

I struggled with both the reading and the practice today. I'm still trying to make sense of it: Identify the feelings that serve as cues to you in a recurring, distressing pattern in a key relationship in your life.
Like... that instant irritation I feels when the spouse does one of those insignificant little things that somehow pushes one of my buttons? Okay. Now, the next time that happens, I need to take a conscious step in creating a new destiny. I got the theory, it's the practice I trip up on.