Jenna > Recent Status Updates

“One 500-page book is not the same as another 500-page book, and likewise one calorie isn’t the same as another calorie.”

“And you see: To him, I,too, was a stranger in the woods.”

“That day changed him. It had changed the entire village.”

“Her first thought on meeting him had been: ordinary. Now she saw that he was not ordinary at all but darkly sinister. It was not just his breath that smelled. Suddenly he was enveloped in a rancid aroma so thick that it was almost foglike.”

“…what we eat matters, how we eat it — in which order, combination, and grouping — matters too.”

“Our bodies speak to us all the time.”

“Do you know what the last thing you ate did to your body and mind?”

Dimitri shrugged. “…pets provided company for lonely people. We don’t have those now of course.”
“Nobody’s lonely here,” Edith agreed.
Claire was quiet. She didn’t say this but she was thinking: I am. I am lonely. Even as she thought it, though, she realized she didn’t really know what the term meant.

I can already feel this story in my gut. There’s something quietly powerful building under the surface.. like you know the emotional weight is coming even before it fully reveals itself.

5 Star Review of Messenger
Pure, Quiet Love

“Something so terrifying was happening that Matty did not even try to assess it.”

“He could tell that it was the same path… but things that had seemed easy and accustomed no longer did. Now everything felt a little different: slightly darker, and decidedly hostile.”
Such is life.

“Leader leaned forward and listened intently as Matty described what he had seen, what he suspected, and what he knew.” sigh… to have someone listen like that, fully present, devoted, it feels like a rare gift."

“…he never cried. But now he wept, and it felt as if the tears were cleansing him, as if his body needed to empty itself.”

“But sometimes he slipped back into the habits of his earlier life, when he had been a sly and deceitful boy in order to survive.”

“Maybe, Matty thought, everything was an illusion to a man who had lost his eyes.”

“Matty inched his way to the door, hoping to slip away unnoticed. But the man heard everything that moved. Matty had known him to hear a spider scurry from one side of its web to another.”

5 Star Review of Gathering Blue
I adore this story. The messages are so powerful and gently told. The true meaning of friendship is described from beginning to end, and it is so pure and genuine. I love the idea of an intuitive understanding of the world around you and your purpose in that world. This story speaks the truths of my own heart and reminds me of the values and feelings I hold most deeply.

5 Star Review of The Giver
A Meditation on What Makes Life Worth Living.
What makes life worth living?
Connection. Feeling. Meaning.
Every time I read The Giver, different themes stand out. It is a book that can be revisited throughout life and continue to leave a deep impression.
I had remembered the ending as hopeful and full of potential. This time, it feels like hope balanced against real mortality.

“If he had stayed, he would have starved in other ways. He would have lived a life hungry for feelings, for color, for love.”

“I liked the feeling of love,” he confessed."

“The books in his own dwelling were the only books that Jonas had ever seen. He had never known that other books existed.”

“If there is 1 practice that we’d recommend to reduce stress, reinforce growth mind-set, and help achieve a healthy body composition, it’s meditation.. The mindful kind, done while conducting everyday tasks like working, talking with a friend, and eating. Being more aware of your food, conversation, or surroundings brings a sense of calm, helps you stay in touch with your body, and reduces the urge to numb..”

“Here’s your book, Annie.”
Suffocating.

“All I ever did was…” proceeds to list an entire horror novel’s worth of atrocities
Staring into the void. Screaming internally (and externally). AS IF THAT’S ALL SHE EVER DID.
Stephen King really said: behold, the understatement of the century.

Starting another round of Whole30, and I always come back to Whole30 Day by Day. I love using it as a simple way to track my days and reference the timeline to stay grounded in my experience and my intention.

This is one of those books I start, put down, forget about… then remember and pick up again. Rinse, repeat.
But this time feels different. Starting another round of Whole30 tomorrow, and Food Freedom Forever feels like the exact companion I need. Intending to finish it, finally.

“Well, if it bothers you so much, I’ll just have to give you something to take your mind off that…”
Me, realizing I am no longer reading Misery — I am being held hostage by it.

“She detested most things about Sir Richard, she had found.” Ughhh. This story is causing my heart to ache.

“No. Annie was not the waiting type. Annie would have watched all twenty episodes in one night, even if they gave her eyestrain and a splitting headache.” Annie Wilkes walked so binge-watchers could run.