In Change There is Power

It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power. 
                                                  --- Alan Cohen

It was about two and a half years ago that I first found this quote. It was appropriate then because I was just starting a new job. Now that job is part of my past, but the sentiment behind this quote is still pertinent in my life.

I am almost always "embracing the new" in one way or another, it seems. I don't know that it is courageous in my case, it's simply pragmatic. It's much easier to embrace it than to fight it. 

Embracing the new is better than being swept along by the inevitable. And "the new" is often thrilling. So I think I'll open my arms wide, welcome in the new, and be grateful for all the good in my life.

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The Crimson Petal and The White

I just finished reading Michael Faber's "The Crimson Petal and the White." I read it for a new book club a friend has started that I've joined. I think it is probably the longest book I've ever read - about 900 pages, but it certainly keeps your interest.

It is set in Victorian England and follows the life of a prostitute as she claws her way from the most humble of beginnings to a different kind of life.

One of the things things I kept thinking as I was reading was, "Hmmm... I think maybe the other people in this book club are smarter than I am." But I now know a lot about contraception in the 1870s in England - not information I ever expected to know. I'm guessing when we meet to discuss the book that people will point out things that I totally missed in my reading.

That's one of the great things about a book club - you read things you never would have picked up on your own, and you get different perspectives on them. I haven't been in a book club for a lot of years so I'm looking forward to this.

One of the funny things about this was I ordered the book while I was visiting my family in rural Kentucky at Thanksgiving. I decided to have it shipped to Kansas. When it arrived, I noticed that it was mailed from a town in Kentucky about an hour from where I was when I ordered it. It probably would have been logical for me to go pick it up. It truly is a small world!

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