​Have you ever thought about how your reading habits and preferences have evolved over time? I was reminded of this yesterday while dusting a couple of shelves at the cabin that house some old paperbacks.

​Maybe you enjoyed reading lots of romance or sci-fi books years ago, but now you prefer a good mystery. Or instead of the small, thick paperbacks like these that you used to pick up in stores years ago, you’ve come to prefer the convenience of e-books. Or the slightly larger paperbacks available now with easier to read fonts.
 
E-books are handy. I purchase plenty of them because I like to read on my phone or tablet, especially while traveling or before I go to sleep at night. But my favorite versions will always be physical copies. I don’t think you can beat the enjoyment of holding an actual book in your hands. My problem is space. While there are still piles of books throughout the house, I have to cull my collection occasionally. But I haven’t touched this small selection in years. Some of these books even transitioned from our camper to our cabin twelve years ago.
 
Besides our preferences of genres and books forms, most readers also have a list of their favorite authors. This lineup grows and expands. Unless an author keeps putting out new books, they risk fading from a reader’s radar, replaced by the writers publishing current bestsellers. Even though we might not actively search for new releases or backlist books written by our once favorite authors anymore, their works have undoubtedly shaped both our reading preferences and our personal lives.
 
Yesterday, as my gaze skipped along the faded and creased covers on the shelves, certain author names jumped out at me and made me wonder. I know some are still writing and publishing, but I wasn’t sure about others, so I did a brief search of each of them. Curious?
 
Here is what I found:
 
Barbara Delinsky–She has over twenty New York Times bestsellers to her credit. Her latest book, A Week at the Shore, came out in 2020. A paragraph within her website’s bio captures why I have always loved her books: she writes relatable characters about everyday people facing emotional crises and challenges.
 
Julie Garwood–Her stories encompass both historical and contemporary timeframes. According to her website, her themes focused on family, loyalty, and honor. She published her first novel, Gentle Warrior, back in 1985. The book on my shelf, The Secret, came out in 1992 (over 30 years ago). She was an incredibly prolific author with many bestsellers. Sadly, Julie Garwood passed away on June 8, 2023. She leaves behind a legacy of beautiful stories that readers will enjoy for years to come. 

​Kristin Hannah–If you are a reader, you are already familiar with this amazing author. Her list of amazing books goes on and on. I found her latest novel, The Four Winds, to be a gut-wrenching account of the dusty days of the Great Depression. I splurged on a beautiful hard copy version of that book when it first came out. They adapted another of her books, Firefly Lane, into a #1 Netflix series. A few weeks ago, I sat alone in front of the television, wiping away tears as I watched the show’s conclusion. This heartwarming story ended with Katherine Heigl swaying and reminiscing on the gift of her beautiful friend to the iconic song “Dancing Queen” by ABBA.
 
Books are so much more than simply a compilation of words.
​

​Mary Alice Monroe–This award-winning author continues to put out incredible books, including her latest instant bestseller, The Summer of Lost and Found. I follow her on social media and admire her dedication to the environment. When I think of Mary Alice Monroe, I think of sea turtles and monarch butterflies.
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​Fern Michaels–No wonder I can’t remember a world without books by Fern Michaels. According to her website (which is a delight and includes personal, current updates), she is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of over 161 published works! Fern Michaels is the pen name of Mary Ruth Kuszkir. If you enjoy Fern’s books, you’ll likely enjoy her website, too, for more insight into the person behind the pen name.

​Nora Roberts–Johanna Lindsey may have kept me reading past my bedtime, but I’ve read (and loved) more books by Nora Roberts than any other author. She is a queen as far as I’m concerned. One report I found stated she has published more than 225 romance novels and has held the number-one spot on the New York Times Best Seller list for a crazy number of weeks throughout the years. She also writes as J.D. Robb. Unfortunately, her popularity isn’t without its shadows, including the plagiarism of her work and book bans. I appreciate that she isn’t afraid to push back against these atrocities. I’ve heard that she also maintains a rigorous writing schedule to this day, despite the incredible success she’s already enjoyed.

LaVyrle Spencer–While I don’t have any of her books on my shelves at the cabin, this trip down memory lane brought her to mind, too. I was an avid reader of her books when I was younger. Her romances extended beyond the primary couple to include families and intriguing plots. This Minnesota author had massive success, but retired from writing years ago. Her books helped shape me as a reader, and probably as a person, as all good stories can.

​It’s doubtful I’ll go back and reread any of these books. Maybe I’ll box them up someday and donate them. But having them near is a bit like having old friends around. All we need to do is crack them open again, and we can travel back in time.
 
While researching these authors, I saw lots of instances where their older books now have updated covers. This makes sense. If a book looks like it’s thirty years old, because cover styles do change, few people will pick them up today. But a modern cover is a smart way to reach more readers when the stories inside are practically timeless.
 
Books stuck in electronic form in our phones and tablets can be like all those photographs we take but never look at again. Sure, they don’t take up space or add potential clutter to our homes, but a physical copy on your shelves is harder to forget and easier to appreciate over time. A dusty old novel may even spur us down a trip on memory lane, reminding us of how certain stories quietly weave themselves into our memories, and perhaps even our souls.
 
Are you a fan of any of these authors or does your list of favorites look completely different? Who would top your list? 

​This is our first Christmas as grandparents! Having a little one around brings back lots of memories from when our kids were young. Last night, as I was sewing the baby’s name on a Christmas stocking, my mind drifted back to one of his daddy’s early holiday seasons. The only thing our nearly three-year-old son asked Santa for that year was the Disney movie “101 Dalmatians”.
 
Back then, Disney would bring certain movies “out of the vault” for a limited time. You’d only find it on store shelves during those windows. Little Josh’s timing was off and the Dalmatians movie wasn’t currently available, so Santa was having a tough time finding that movie for him. As the elf assigned to help Santa find that perfect gift for our son’s third Christmas, I refused to give up.

​Help arrived from an unexpected source that year. My youngest brother had moved to Ohio for work and he was dating someone we hadn’t met yet. As luck would have it, the young woman collected Disney movies. Not only did she have an impressive collection, she generously offered to help Santa out so he wouldn’t disappoint Joshua.
 
Now, nearly any movie you want to watch is available with the click of a few buttons—and maybe a few dollars—to stream directly into your living room. But this was long before streaming. This desperate elf / momma found her brother’s friend’s offer of a movie from her personal collection to be very generous indeed.
 
I still remember Joshua standing in front of my parent’s picture window, his little feet balancing on the heat register while he gripped the narrow trim, his eyes searching the sky for any sign of Santa Claus.

​Joshua thought he heard a sound on the roof, and when the knock at the door came, his excitement edged toward terror as the big guy himself strolled into Grandma and Grandpa’s house. It helped that Santa brought the movie he’d asked for, but only a little. 

​My brother’s new girlfriend had hand delivered her movie to Santa Claus before he swung by the house to say hello to Joshua, and she’s been back with us for the holidays almost every December in the twenty-six years since that first Christmas.
 
Her willingness to help us out was an excellent sign, and she’s been an amazing sister-in-law and aunt  ever since. Oh… and an awesome wife to my brother, too!
 
Thank you, Joey, for making a little boy’s Santa wish come true.
 
Love, Santa’s elf / aka Joshua’s mom

​Did you go through a scrapbooking phase like I did? In the mid-nineties, when we were having our first of three kids, I stocked up on all the supplies and spent fun weekends with girlfriends, working on our books and enjoying the winter days at a lodge in Minnesota.
 
But I think I got one thing wrong. Like most new moms, I tried to do too much.
 
The first book I made for our oldest is so thick the binders can hardly hold it together, and it only captured his first year! Over the next few years, I continued building these keepsake books, and admittedly they got a little smaller each time, but my drive to “do it all” led to burnout. I’ve done little scrapbooking since.
 
My mom didn’t normally scrapbook, however, she spent countless nights leading up to Christmas 2000, creating three books: one for me and one for each of my two brothers. My book is thick, but she captured highlights from the first 34 years of my life on those pages. As a bonus, the first few pages are all about our great-grandparents, grandparents, and other relatives that are now long gone. She included photographs I’d never seen before.

​Mom took the time to handwrite so many important snippets of our history on those pages. Her own handwriting on every page makes this book even more priceless to me. 

​Here is a picture of part of one page in the book she created for me. The one of a little girl in the lap of a woman is actually me at two years old and my Great Aunt Mary. I included a photocopy of this picture on the Author Bio page of my holiday novel, "Capturing Wishes". The next page in my scrapbook included a quick summary of what early Christmases looked like for Mom (Linda) as a child. She grew up with three sisters and her mother was Onie Johnson (sister to Aunt Mary Nierling):

“The Johnsons spent every Christmas with the Nierlings. They would have tuna hotdish on Christmas Eve at home, then go to Aunt Mary’s. Each of the kids would have their own corner where Santa would leave their gift. After opening all the gifts, everyone would go to Midnight Mass, then back to Aunt Mary’s for a huge breakfast. On Christmas morning, Onie would shorten new Christmas dresses for all four girls. Linda’s most memorable gift was a Toni Doll and lots of clothes made by Onie, who had stayed up night after night—sewing after all were in bed. We would join all our cousins at Aunt Mary’s for a big turkey dinner and play with all our new games!” 

​This brief paragraph conjures up so many fun, vivid images in my mind. I can just picture my dear grandmother, hunched over an old Singer sewing machine, working on doll clothes and new dresses for her four young daughters. I spent time at Aunt Mary’s house when I was young, and I wonder which corner was assigned to my mom.
 
Revisiting my scrapbook this morning has inspired me to, maybe, pull out my old “work in process” books for our three kids during the new year. I’d be more selective in the pictures I include, and spend more time on the “stories” behind the images, including names, so when someone runs across those pictures in the years to come, they won’t just be looking at nameless faces.
 
These days, we take countless snapshots with the phones that are almost constantly in our hands. But how many of those do we bother to convert from a digital image, so easily lost, into something more tangible that could tell our stories to future generations?
 
Thank you, Mom, for taking so much time during those fall and winter evenings, twenty-two years ago, to record our stories. It is a gift I’ll treasure forever.

Original Post 12/16/18 (updates added below as of 11/27/22):
 
How many choices would you say you make in a single day? Would it be safe to say we make thousands of choices between the time we wake up and the time we go to bed?
 
We have to decide what time to get up, what to wear, what to eat, and the list goes on and on. Much of our days are spent doing things we decided to do a long time ago.
 
Yesterday, our middle child graduated from college, following in her older brother’s footsteps. Needless to say, we are incredibly proud of all the hard work she’s put in to reach this milestone. The number of decisions it took for her to reach this point is almost mindboggling. All along the way, she had to choose whether or not to do the things she had to do if she wanted to earn a college degree.
 
As we watched the many graduates file into the auditorium, garbed in their caps and gowns, I couldn’t help but marvel at both the efforts it took for each of them to reach that point but also the endless possibilities stretching out before them. Most are at the very beginning of what will become their life
work. Some are charting a new course for themselves, making a choice to do something different.

​I wondered how many of them knew what their next step would be. How many will find work in their chosen field? Would they like it once they were out there, working in the real world?
 
I have to admit, a tiny part of me even felt a twinge of jealousy. What would it be like to be twenty-something again, with nearly unlimited options ahead of me?
 
But it didn’t take me long to remember how scary it felt. Endless choices can be overwhelming and more than a little scary. Back then, the choices didn’t feel endless.
 
I also like to think I’ve learned a thing or two through the years since I last stood there in a cap and gown. Life teaches us all so much. Some of those lessons are best learned one time. Some are so painful I’d prefer never to have to repeat them.
 
So while I wouldn’t want to be twenty-two again, are there some things I wish I would have known then that I know now? Silly question, right?!
 
•   I would tell my younger self to take more chances. To not always make the safest, least risky choice.
•   I would assure my younger self I was smart enough and strong enough to take on big challenges and not settle.
•   I would work harder to maintain those relationships in life that meant the most to me. I’d hug more and argue less. I’d let petty things go and find joy in the little things.
•   I’d move more and sit less. And I’d definitely dance more.
•   I would stress less about specific work tasks. It was never worth it.
•  I’d warn myself that the endless list of tiny choices I’d make, day in and day out, would ultimately result in the quality of my life. It’s seldom the biggest choices we make, that seem so monumental at the time, that impact us the most.

Wow, I’d have been so much smarter if I could have shared all of this with my twenty-two-year-old self! But the reality is that even if that were possible, it might not have made any difference. Because until we live these things ourselves, and truly appreciate the impact of the choices we make, we won’t take someone else’s word for it. While the years may not always be kind to us, the lessons we pick up along the way will be invaluable.
 
We can’t go back. I wouldn’t want to go back. But we don’t have to. None of us are really much different from all those graduates standing in that auditorium yesterday. We all have endless possibilities before us. We just have to open our eyes to them. There are blessings in the hard-won wisdom we possess by the time we’re fifty-two instead of twenty-two. We know it’s better if we chose the wheat bread over the white bread and the vegetables over the chocolate. It’s better to find work we love than suffer through work that pays better. And relationships are worth fighting for, even on those days when you might not like the other person all that much.
 
It’s all about making better choices. And that’s hard to do until you have your own life experiences to draw upon.
 
Since I can’t go back and tell my twenty-two-year-old-self anything, I’ll instead remind my fifty-two-year-old self of a few essential things:

Having the gift of choice is a blessing. Choose wisely as often as you can, and when you stumble because of a poor choice, forgive yourself and chalk it up to some more of that hard-earned wisdom. Choose better next time.
 
Challenge yourself and encourage others. And please forgive me, but as a proud parent, I have to add one last note. As I finish writing today’s post, our youngest just popped into the room to tell us she got accepted into the top two colleges of her choice. Now she has a choice to make. The circle of life continues.
 
Updates 11/27/22:
 
Speaking of the circle of life and how our choices impact us, here is a summary of some of the bigger choices my family has made in the four years since my original blog post in late 2018:

• Our daughter chose to go on to optometry school after her graduation from UND. She is currently doing rotations around the U.S. and will graduate with her Doctor of Optometry next May. She also married the man she’d dated since high school and they are happily building a life together.
• Our youngest daughter chose to attend UND as well. She’ll graduate with a degree in Biology next May, and is considering additional schooling in the medical field. She has more choices to make soon.
• Our son and his wife, newly married in my earlier post, made the choice to have a child, making us grandparents!
• My husband made a career change and is thriving at his new job.
• I quit my corporate job after thirty-one years to pursue my dream of writing novels and finally enjoy some time freedom. I even wrote a novel called “Choosing Again”!

 
Some choices can be scary to consider and difficult to make, but hindsight can offer reassurances that the worst-case scenarios almost never come to pass. There is even more joy to be found when we bet on ourselves.

Always in your corner, cheering you on!   Kim