Enlightenment Through Solitude (Winter in Beijing)

This winter I will embark on a new journey in China. The journey of "Enlightenment Through Solitude." The winters are brutal, so living a somewhat hermit lifestyle will help me get through some difficult things I have not dealt with fully. As part of my endurance project, I will continue to produce new work, writings, and make myself read some things I've been meaning to read.

Reading List for my "Enlightenment Through Solitude" experience in Beijing Winter 2008-09.

1) The King James Bible
2) American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau
3) Riding the Iron Rooster, Paul Theroux
4) No one belongs here more than you. Miranda July
5)

Friends suggestions:
Tolstoy's Anna Karenina
Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own (1929)


I also decided to get some books on tape. I like being read to and the sounds fill the space, making cold, quite, winter nights seem warm.
On my Audible list:
1) Anna Karenina (sorry Krista! its huge and ran out of packing space, but i really wanted to hear the story)
2) Malcolm Gladwell's new Outliers
3) David Sedaris' Naked & Holidays on Ice

I have a growing WISHLIST too! Lets hope I can download from there.


Reading for when I return:
The Plum in the Golden Vase (3/5 written) David Tod Roy's Translation (93, 01, 06)
Jin Ping Mei original English translation The Golden Lotus (1939), Clement Egerton



As with any great laborious journey, I will celebrate with some decadent beach vacation for the Chinese New Year, marking the end of a chapter. I am enlisting a crew to ensure help me celebrate.

Contact me for details.

ps
for those of you who have not received news of Henry and I's break up, Henry ended things with an "I'm not ready" and since I have found new inspiration and have a lot of gratitude for what seemed at first to be bad news. I am looking forward to taking a leap into my future with an new found eagerness to see what is next.


Don't be sad, it is afterall just another chapter. And in all fairness, I wouldn't have gotten to Beijing if it weren't for my interlude with Henry. I had compromised too much to be with him, hoping he might surprise me. Well, he just confirmed all my fears and I can confidently move forward without him.