B139. A Personal Inventory of 2017

Health 

2017 has been a challenging year healthwise. Thus health merits the lead story for the year. As the year began, I was recovering from Dec. 2016 strabismus (eye muscle) surgery. Then in June I had a needed follow-up surgery, also for the strabismus. The surgeries were successful, except that they left my brain confused, having compensated for the strabismus for so long. I struggled all year with something called torticollis, which is an involuntary turning of the neck, causing my head to always be turned to the left instead of straight ahead. At this writing, I have just had a first botox injection to relieve this, and I'm hopeful 2018 will be a new beginning.

Speaking and Blogging

Because of the problems with my eyes and my neck, two of my favorite activities have been difficult this year: reading and writing. Thus, I posted far fewer blogs this year than any year since I began blogging, back in the MySpace days! I did get to speak in November at JMU; and the few blogs I put out were these:

B133.  Racism: It's Time To Change the Way We Talk about It (and the Way We Listen) (challenge)
B134. Dust As I Am (religion)
B135.  Three Tales (personal story)
B136. Just a Story about my Lawn (personal story)
B137. One Puzzle, Many Pieces(challenge)
B138. Salisbury City Council Candidate Recommendations (politics)


Volunteer Work

Communities in Schools - 3rd grade literacy
Literacy Council - adult literacy
Lee St. Theatre
RHM Food Pantry
Campaigning for now City Council Person Sheffield and now mayor Heggins


Travel

Columbus, OH (August): Scioto Mile, Short North Arts District, Kelton House (Underground RR), Franklin Park Conservatory (butterfly exhibit), Fresh Market, German Village, Pistacia Vera

Atlanta, GA (Sept): Centennial Olympic Park, MLK house/church/burial site, Aviva by Kameel, CNN, Atlanta Breakfast Club, Center for Civil & Human Rights, Rolane, Debby

Church

I've been a Presbyterian now for 5 years and am loving my church. This year I've continued to be active in my Sunday School class and my small group.  I got to lead the Presbyterian Women's Bible Study for two months, and I'm serving currently on the Pastor Search committee.

Books I Read (or listened to): 32, listed in order of publication

The Odyssey (Homer, c. 800 BCE), audio)
The Canterbury Tales (Geoffrey Chaucer, 14th century, audio)

Look Homeward, Angel Unabridged (Thomas Wolfe, 1929/2000, audio)

**The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck, 1939, audio)

*Animal Farm (George Orwell, 1945, audio)

**1984 (George Orwell, 1949)
*The Old Man and the Sea (Ernest Hemingway, 1952, audio)

The Strange Career of Jim Crow (C. Vann Woodward, 1957)

The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb (Eric H.F. Law, 1993)

The Best Things Ever Said about Parenting (Bill & Nancie Carmichael, 1996)

The Shunning (Beverly Lewis, 1997)
Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind (Ann B. Ross, 1999, audio) Good Harbor (Anita Diamont, 2001, audio)

*Walking in this World (Julia Cameron, 2001)

Teacher Man  (Frank McCourt, 2005, audio) Women Who Read Are Dangerous (Stefan Bollman, 2006)
Finding Water (Julia Cameron, 2006)
Secrets in the Dark (Frederick Buechner, 2006)

Cotton Patch Gospel: The Complete Collection (Clarence Jordan, 2012)

The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton 1965-2010 ( ed. Young & Glaser, 2012)

The Royal Queen Elizabeth Miller (Audrey Blackford, 2014)

Almost Famous Women (Megan Mayhew Bergman, 2015)

**The Firebrand and the First Lady (Patricia Bell-Scott, 2016)

**America’s Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege . . . (Jim Wallis, 2016)
Becoming Wise (Krista Tippett, 2016)
*The Underground Railroad (Colson Whitehead, 2016, audio)
Who Is Jesus: What a Difference a Lens Makes (2016, Judy Yates Siker)

*Small Great Things (Jodi Picoult, 2016, audio)

Personal Diaries & Journals (Jan. 1975 - Feb. 2017)

The Last Generation on the Farm (twice, D. Schneck / J. Schneck, 2017)

Salem Presbytery Pastoral Search Manual (2017) a not yet published novel (written 2017)

Saw On Stage: 9

The Diary of Anne Frank (LST, Feb.)

Blood Done Sign My Name (St. John’s Lutheran, Feb.)

Sister Act (PPT, Mar.)
Voices from the Margin: Point Blank (LST, Apr.)

The Dixie Swim Club (LST, Aug.)
Mothers and Sons (LST, Sept.)
*Next to Normal (LST, Nov.)
Peter and the Starcatcher (ASC, Nov.) Piedmont Prime Time Community Band Christmas Concert (Dec.)



Because reading and writing were such a struggle this year, I watched more TV and ridiculously more movies than my norm.
TV The Mary Tyler Moore Show (season 1, 1970) The Brontes of Haworth (miniseries, 1973)

Gilmore Girls (season 1, 2000-01)

Big Bang Theory (season 10, 2016-17)

Jane the Virgin (season 3, 2016-17)

**The Vietnam War  (PBS K. Burns / L. Novick 10-episode documentary, 2017)

Movies: 102, listed by release year

A Farewell to Arms (1932)

42nd Street (1933)

The Count of Monte Cristo (1934)

Bringing Up Baby (1938)
Gulliver’s Travels (1939)

*The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

Casablanca (1942, 75th anniv. showing, twice)
A Canterbury Tale (1944)

Captain Kidd (1945)

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947)

**Broken Arrow (1950)
Harvey (1950) Roman Holiday (1953)White Christmas (1954)

The Caine Mutiny (1954)

1984 (1956)

*Anne Frank’s Diary (1959)
*Inherit the Wind (1960)

Butterfield 8 (1960)

Bye Bye Birdie (1963)

Cool Hand Luke (1967)

*Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967, 50th anniv. showing, repeat)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

David Copperfield (1969)
Baldwin’s N-gg-r (1969)
Hello Dolly (1969)

The Call of the Wild (1972)

Cabaret (1972)
A Doll’s House (1973)

Claudine (1974)

The Eagle Has Landed (1976)
Julia (1977)
The Goodbye Girl (1977)

Chariots of Fire (1981, repeat)
Terms of Endearment (1983, repeat)

The Bostonians (1984)
*The Jesse Owens Story (1984)

The Fourth Wise Man (1985)

Empire of the Sun (1987)

**Dead Poets Society (1989, repeat)

**Dances with Wolves (1990, repeat)

City of Joy (1992)

Bye Bye Love (1995)
Blast from the Past (1999)

Matrix (1999)

The Crossing (2000)

These Old Broads (2001)

Christy:A New Beginning (2001)
**Goodbye, Mr. Chips (2002)

Radio (2003)
Hidalgo (2004)

*First Daughter (2004)

Catwoman (2004)
A Good Year (2006)
The Jane Austen Book Club (2007)

December Boys (2007)
*For the Bible Tells Me So (2007, repeat)

*Chasing 3000 (2008)
*Prayers for Bobby (2009, Lifetime, repeat)

An Education (2009)

From Time to Time (2009)
Animal Farm (2009)
The Happy Poet (2010)
How Do You Know? (2010)

*The Client (2010)

*Infancia Clandestina (Clandestine Childhood) (2011)
*The Wise Kids (2011)
Atlas Shrugged Part 1 (2011)
Atlas Shrugged Part 2 (2012)

*Emperor (2012)
Blue Jasmine (2013)
*Captain Phillips (2013)
Black Nativity (2013)
The Great Gatsby (2013)
Atlas Shrugged Part 3 (2014)
**The Good Lie (2014)

*Creed (2015)

Diary of a Chambermaid (2015)
Coat of Many Colors (2015)

*Suffragette (2015)

Florence Foster Jenkins (2016)

Finding Dory (2016)
Mr. Church  (2016)

The Innocents (2016)

**Hidden Figures (2016)

**The Shack (2017)

Beauty and the Beast (2017)

*Wonder Woman (2017, twice)
*Battle of the Sexes (2017)
Victoria & Abdul (2017)

Expectations for 2018

Better health, more blogging, and far fewer movies
Possible travels to Indianapolis and Orlando



* ** my favorites