It won’t be too much longer before the school year starts again. It will be my 20th year. It’s hard to believe. It will be my fifth year at my current school. That time has flown by. I started four years ago as a technology integration specialist. Now I’m the English department chair. I love it. The people I work with are amazing. I have made some great friends. I love where I live. I feel good. I feel successful. I have an education blog where I tend to write about teaching. This blog originally started as a personal blog. A hodge podge of whatever I was interested in at the moment. Over time, it evolved in a books-only blog. I have been missing the hodge podge lately.

I am thinking a lot about a book I’m reading, The Bitch is Back: Older, Wiser, and (Getting) Happier, edited by Cathi Hanauer. I’m reading it as part of a book tour. So far, I am really getting a lot out of it. One thing that impresses me as I read the essays in the book is that these women have an outlet and audience for things they’re thinking about. There is no reason I have to write just about books here, but some reason, for a long time, that’s what I’ve been doing. I don’t know if I thought people wouldn’t be interested in other things I might write (though it has crossed my mind), or if I thought that people would be confused about what, exactly, this blog is (as though it has to be something or other). I don’t think I would want to use a different blog to write about these topics, so I think I will use this one. I did contemplate starting another blog, even something without my name attached. I don’t need that kind of compartmentalization or confusion, though. I’m getting older, and with it has come a certain amount of, for lack of a better term, bravery. I find I care a little less what people think, though as someone with anxiety, I can’t stop caring completely—I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t care. I have things I want to say. I have worries about getting older. I have health issues. I have a wonderful family. I love music. I live in a beautiful state. There is a lot going on in my head besides books and reading.

What I’m trying to say is that I want to use this blog more like I used to use it. More like a hodge podge. I’ll still review my books here. But I will write about other things, too.