Guest Editor (I'm so excited!)

Hello everyone, my name is Sheria and I’m thrilled to be guest editor!  I’m supposed to tell you a little about me, so here goes.

 

I was born in 1955 in Stantonsburg, a little southern town in eastern North Carolina.  Okay let’s skip a few years, otherwise I’ll tell all my secrets.

 

I’ve lived in NC all of my life.  On those forms that ask for status, I check the box that reads: single, never married.  I live alone except for LaLa (the yellow Teletubbie, it’s a long story and I’ll blog about it someday).  I had a mid life crisis when I turned 39 and left my career as a high school English teacher to become a lawyer.  I’ve worked for Legal Aid and most recently for a nonprofit policy advocacy group, which has disappointed my friends and family who all expected that I would become wealthy upon passing the bar.  Okay, I sort of planned to become wealthy but I discovered that I wasn’t temperamentally suited to billable hours and preferred public interest law. 

 

I love music and have eclectic tastes.  My CD collection includes Patsy Cline, Celine Dion, Prince, Bob Marley, Kiri Te Kanawa, and Aretha Franklin.  I also love to read, watch movies (especially old movies from the 30’s and 40’s) and cook for my friends.  I write poetry and I’m working on my first book.

 

Okay, that’s it; I need to talk about my picks.  They are in no particular order of importance.

 

First up is How Did I Get Here?   Wendy O’Donnell says that hers is a “journal of motherhood, life, wonderment, and unceasing irritation.”  It was the unceasing irritation part that hooked me.  She’s very witty and writes about those everyday pieces of life that make us all a little nuts.

 

I ran across Naked on Roller Skates in another blogger’s links list.  I was intrigued by the title and checked it out.  Nancy is a fellow North Carolinian.  There is so much heart in her writing.  I was moved to tears by her remembrances of her deceased father.  She also has a great sense of wry humor, particularly in writing about her children.  Reading Nancy’s blog is like sitting down with a friend for coffee and a chat.

 

I stumbled across On the Move while I was checking to see if my own blog was listed in the Journal’s index.  (It is!)  Ian is a 43-year-old guy somewhere in the UK who loves to cook.  He also loves to take pictures and in my humble opinion is a very good photographer.  He and his wife are in the process of selling their house and I confess that I was on pins and needles when the first buyer changed his mind and jubilant when another buyer showed interest.  Check out his mini slide shows, they are wonderful shots of waterfalls and seashores, etc., and you can increase or decrease how long you want each slide to linger on the screen.  For more of Ian’s photos and other writing, including poetry, go to www.photographerian.co.uk.

 

Daughters of the Shadow Men hypnotized me with its frank and powerful discussions of life from the perspective of a 75 year-old-woman.  There is much pain in this journal but I am drawn back to it over and over again.  She writes with unwavering honesty about her suspicions that her father was gay and her own missteps in choosing men to love.  I weep with her but I also admire her tenacity in being a survivor. (content warning)

 

For a change of pace, check out My Life Change and Weight Loss Journey aka My Diet.  This journal is for anyone who has ever struggled with weight loss.  It is witty, entertaining, and inspiring.  Stacy had me totally hooked when Jimmy Buffet’s “Lime in the Coconut” began playing when I opened her blog.  This is the perfect site for when you really want to eat that bag of Pepperidge Farm Chessmen cookies and that pint of Ben & Jerry’s French Vanilla in the freezer.  Read Stacy; you may still eat the cookies and ice cream but you’ll laugh while you’re stuffing your face!

 

Finally, a friend sent me the link to Kleinschmidt 2005 about a month ago and I’ve been a regular reader ever since.  This is a political blog that focuses on some national issues but with a lot about North Carolina politics.  I think of Kleinschmidt as a political humanist, concerned about the well being of all humankind.  He’s a councilman in Chapel Hill, NC, home of the University of North Carolina (UNC Tarheels!).  I freely admit to being a liberal and proud of it; this blog is not everyone’s glass of iced tea but like all southerners, I love iced tea!

 

Well that’s it folks; I hope that you will check out my picks.  Enjoy!