So, I'm back to school....

I decided at the last minute to pick up two more half credits this summer.  Thankfully, they only involve a Monday afternoon and a Wednesday evening for the next twelve weeks.  Both of them are Thanatology courses. Okay...you're probably wondering: what the heck is Thanatology? It's the study of death and dying.  One class is Children & Death: Theory and Interventions, and the second is Suicide: Theory and Interventions.  I DID NOT want to take either of these courses, but I DID want a lighter load in the coming school year, and these are acceptable electives. But having been to one class already, it's actually (and unexpectedly) quite interesting. I am also starting a Child and Adolescent Therapy half course next Monday morning, but it's an everyday thing, for three weeks -- quick and dirty academia!

In the quilting vein of things, I now have all of my Virginia Bound sub-units sewn together into 20 complete blocks, and all of the foundation paper removed.  Maybe I'll get them assembled tomorrow!

I just started reading "The Household Guide to Dying" (speaking of thanatology...) by Debra Adelaide.

Delia has made a living writing modern household guides. If you ask, she can tell you how to get the wine stain out of your linen, and the proper way to boil an egg. As the book opens, she is not yet forty, but has only a short time to live.

Unlike the many fans of her advice column—people who can't quite cope with dirty shirt collars—Delia knows just what to do. What she needs is a manual —the kind she is expert at writing. Realizing this could be her greatest achievement, she sets to work. But in the writing, she is forced to confront the ghosts of her past: She realizes that there is a journey she needs to make and one last vital thing she needs to do.

Yet just as Delia is coming to terms with the impossibility of her to-do list, an unexpected visitor helps her believe in her life's worth in a wholly surprising way. Witty and uplifting, The Household Guide to Dying is a beautifully written novel about life.

Here's a link to Debra Adelaide's website.  I'm only a half dozen pages or so into it, and I can tell it's going to be a slow read....not 'cuz it's bad, but because the words are laid down in a way to be savoured.  It's truly beautiful writing, and I can't bear to gobble it up all at once.