Magical Journey – and a giveaway!

At the end of this review, see details about how to win a signed copy!

To say that I was excited to read Katrina Kenison’s new book, Magical Journey: An Apprenticeship in Contentment, is an almost ridiculous understatement.  I read The Gift of an Ordinary Day a couple of years ago in one breathless gulp, astonished to have found someone whose writing so closely – albeit more beautifully and more eloquently – mirrored the contents of my own heart and spirit.  Quickly, I read Katrina’s first book, Mitten Strings from God, which moved me as well.  And then, in a twist of events that reminded me of how benevolent this universe can be, I bumped into Katrina at a coffee shop less than a mile from my house.  Although we had never met, we recognized each other immediately.  After that, we began corresponding, and I am now privileged and honored to call Katrina a teacher, a mentor, and a friend.

Reading Katrina’s writing is a unique experience for me.  It feels like a call and response chant with my own thoughts.  In her trademark sensitive, lambent prose, Katrina touches on things, topics, and feelings that are among my most fiercely-believed, deeply-buried, and profoundly-felt.  Many times as I read Magical Journey I gasped audibly, when I read lines from my very favorite poem or the description of a sentiment I know so well it feels like it beats in my own chest.  Perhaps most of all, Katrina and I share the same preoccupation with impermanence; our spirits circle around a similar wound, which has to do with how quickly this life flies by, and with how irreplaceable these days are.  Both The Gift of an Ordinary Day and Magical Journey are suffused with a bittersweet awareness of time’s passage that is keenly, almost uncomfortably familiar to me.

Magical Journey opens with enormous twin losses: Katrina’s sons have both left the house (her older son to college, and her younger son to boarding school) and soon thereafter one of her dearest friends dies after a multi-year battle with cancer.  These two events form a cloud that stands between Katrina and the sun, and the book takes place in their shadow.  Magical Journey is Katrina’s reckoning with life on the other side of these two farewells, and with entering the “afternoon of life,” when she is “aware as never before that our time here is finite.”

Though different, each of the losses that Katrina experiences are both irrevocable and life-altering.  I related to both.  I read about Katrina grieving the years when her children lived at home with tears running down my face.  She describes the particular, poignant reality of life with small children at home and I weep, because while I am in those years, right now, I am already mourning them.  No matter how I avert my gaze, I can’t stop staring at the bald truth that these days are numbered; I cry daily for the loss of the days I am still living.

At times my nostalgia for our family life as it used to be – for our own imperfect, cherished, irretrievable past – is nearly overwhelming.  The life my husband and sons and I had together, cast now in the golden light of memory, seems unbearably precious. 

I can’t read this paragraph without active sobs, because if I am aware of the preciousness of these days to the point of pain now, how will I possibly exist with their memory when they are gone?  This question stymies me regularly, and brings me to my knees with its resolute, stubborn immovability.  Luckily for me, Katrina provides a guide, lights a lamp, and has she has for several years now, shows me that there is a path forward.

Katrina’s other seminal experience, that of walking with her friend Marie through cancer and, to death, is familiar to me because my mother did the very same thing with her best friend, my “second mother,” who died at 49 of cancer.  Katrina shares with Marie the intense intimacy of late-stage cancer and death.  “Staying – in mind and body and spirit – was in itself a kind of journey, and traveling quietly at her side to death’s door was, apart from giving birth, the single most important thing I have ever done.”  Katrina’s description of the last weeks and days of Marie’s life evokes the immense power in simply staying.  This theme, of the vital importance of abiding with our friends, our emotions, our lives, recurs later in the book, when after a month at Kripalu, Katrina observes that “going away, even for a short time, taught me something about it means to stay.”

Marie dies only a few weeks after Katrina’s second son leaves home.  Though she returns to her own home and her own life, Katrina finds both changed and foreign.  She is reminded that “no matter how much effort I pour into trying to reshape reality, I am not really in control of much at all.”  Thus commences a dark season for Katrina, months of finding her balance in a world that looks the same as always but that is in fact utterly changed.  Her empty house swarms with memories, she watches dusk fall early over the mountains outside of her kitchen window, and she finds herself turning more and more to her long-time yoga practice.

I have to surrender all over again to the truth that being alive means letting go.  I have to trust that being right where I am really is some kind of progress, and that there is a reason I’ve been called to visit this lonely darkness.

It is literally fall and winter when Katrina enters this phase of change, of letting go, all over again.  She decides to participate in a month-long teacher training program at Kripalu, and finds herself profoundly moved by the experience.  Katrina is drawn to Kripalu by some power that she cannot name, some force that has directed all of her perambulations since Marie’s death and her son’s departure.  Of this time she writes,  “…I have been lonely and adrift, as if some current is tugging me down, pulling me beneath the surface of my life to go in search of something I have no words for.”  At Kripalu Katrina does indeed go beneath the surface: of her life, of the lives of her roommates, of her own expectations, of all that has been known.  And she emerges feeling “as if I’ve put on a pair of 3-D glasses and the whole world, instead of being out at arm’s length, is right in my face: intense, complex, exquisitely beautiful.”

Katrina begins to reimmerse herself in her “ordinary life,” one whose shimmering beauty she now appreciates more fully.  She revisits her undergraduate alma mater and has an encounter with a shop owner that reminds her of how the past continues to echo into the present.  Even when those vibrations are not consciously felt, they are there.  Katrina reconnects with college classmates and sees their connections in new ways; she and a roomful of her exact contemporaries end up in a deep, honest conversation about what it is to face this next season of life.  In keeping with Magical Journey‘s theme that letting go of what we thought allows us to touch what is, Katrina notes how differently she measures her life now than the 21 year old starry-eyed college graduate thought she might:

How could I have known that the freedom that seemed so desirable and elusive in my twenties would come not from escaping myself, but from finally accepting myself?  Or that liberation – that world we threw about so earnestly as undergraduates – would turn out not to be about grabbing the brass ring, nailing the dream job, or getting the life I always wanted, but rather about fully experiencing the startling beauty, the pain, the wonder and surprise of the great, winding journey itself?

My copy of Magical Journey is full of underlined passages, stars and exclamation marks in the margins, and indentations where tears fell, dark on the page, and dried.  I have always loved Katrina’s writing, found wisdom that makes me gasp and expressions of things I’ve long felt and held dear, and this book is no different.  Magical Journey is composed of gorgeous sentences and full of images I will never forget.

Magical Journey is a powerfully hopeful book, one that starts in a morass of loss and winds up, with a palpable sense of both peace and freedom, in a cabin in Maine.  Katrina’s journey – which is indeed a magical one – is internal, quiet, invisible to the eye.  She is grappling with nothing less than her own mortality.  Mortality – and its irrefutable handmaiden, impermanence – is the heartbeat of this book, running through every line, limning the entire volume with the piercing, and temporary, beauty of this human life.  The conclusion of the book’s titular journey is that there isn’t one.  Life, and particularly the second half of it, is about learning to embrace paradox, to release expectations, and to look carefully around so that we don’t miss a minute.

Perhaps the central work of aging has to do with starting to realize that each of us must learn how to die, that falling apart happens continually, and that our own experience of being alive is never simply either/or, never black or white, good or bad, but both – both and more.  Not life or death, but life and death, darkness and light, empty and full.  Two currents sometimes running side by side, yet often as not entwining into one, our feelings and emotions not separate and discrete but instead streaming together into a flow that contains everything together and in constant flux – all our love and loss, all our happiness and heartache, all our hope and our hopelessness as well.

I wish I could convey how powerful and beautiful this book is.  Unfortunately I don’t have the words.  I hope you will read it and see for yourself.  Happily, Katrina has offered a signed book to a reader of this blog.  Please comment and I will pick a winner on Thursday evening.

The book’s video, below, offers another lovely glimpse into Magical Journey.  I keep watching it, and every time I’m touched anew.

72 thoughts on “Magical Journey – and a giveaway!”

  1. I read Mitten Strings For God while pregnant with my first child at the age of 39 and have been following Katrina Kenison ever since. I am pretty certain her blog is how I found your blog. My 2 girls are now 7 and 9, and it is so easy to get into a place where there is rushing and go, go, go, and so nice to come to these blogs to remember to pay attention.

  2. According to Amazon my book shall arrive today. I can hardly wait! Her previous books found their way into my heart at just the right moments before and I love the idea of beginning my 2013 with her wise words. Maybe 2013 will be my own magical journey? 🙂

  3. I am so excited to read Katrina’s latest. I love everything she writes. And what a beautiful job you have done writing about a book that is so ‘big’ in this one post.

  5. I have added this to my list. I’ve been reading your blog for the past year and its helped me through a year of change, career decisions and settling into my new, real role as mother to my toddler twins and center of my home. I’m always looking for new book recommendations and have been making my way through many of the books on your list that were unknown to me.

    Thanks for your daily thoughts- they make me feel calm and centered in the morning and there was a time a year ago when I wasnt sure those feelings were possible anymore!

  6. My copy is supposed to arrive today as well, and your review sums up why I am excited to read Katrina’s new book. Your review had me in tears, and reminded me of the beauty of this life. I can’t wait to read, underline and cry through the actual book.

  7. Katrina and I are at similar stages of life – her last two books have been great gifts, well timed for me. So looking forward to this one… Thanks for this gorgeous review, Lindsey!

  8. Beautiful, Lindsey. “It feels like a call and response chant with my own thoughts.” Yes.

    If I win the giveaway, I have many people in mind who will love this book.

  9. Happy New Year Lindsey! In the morning, I read your blog first and Erin’s Elements of Style next. Thanks to you, I just finished Dani Shapiro’s book Devotion and I am currently reading Katrina’s Ordinary Day now. I am half way through (and if we were not knee deep into basketball season) I would have finished it by now! So grateful to know we are sharing this “journey” together and that I have writers, like yourself, to help me express my deepest darkness and joy that I have been experiencing most recently.

    XOX Dana

  10. i love katrina’s writing. i love your writing, lindsey. you writing about katrina’s writing is almost too much for my heart this morning. an immense thank you for weaving your soulful journey with hers. thank you for this generous and exquisite offering. grateful to and for you.

  11. Lovely review of what sounds like a breathtaking book. I often think of “Gifts” as I watch my own teen sons grow up, and inevitably, away. Glad to know of more like minds and hearts out there!

  13. Looking forward to reading this book – I read Mitten Strings from God while going through some tough times with my son, and have yet to find some spare time to read the second book of Katrina’s, and now I have to find time to read the third! These long winter nights might be perfect…

  14. I’ve read all of Katrina’s books and have been anxiously awaiting this one. I want to introduce my sister to her writing and feel that this book and its message, is just the right way to open her heart to the “gifts” that Katrina has offered the world with her writing.

  16. I have never read her books, but your post just made me request her books from the library before I even wrote here for the giveaway! Can’t wait to read her words!

  18. Katrina writes well. When I first read The Gift of an ordinary day, many things she said resonated so deeply. Here is one woman who is so honest with herself, that I could feel validated with myself. It is comforting to know that I am not alone. I have two boys who are in elementary school. Watching them grow and reminding myself to treasure the ordinary is something I learnt from Katrina. Thanks.

  19. I loved the video. I was especially touched when I saw Katrina with her son (s). I am the mother of a 19 year old son and a 23 year old daughter. While raising our daughter was tough in its own way i.e. hormones. Raising a son poses its own difficulties and when I saw her hug and kiss them (not sure if it was the same son or different sons) it brought tears to my eyes. I know how difficult it is to let go and allow them to grow up. It seemed to happen so fast; moving from playing leggos and video games to having serious interests about his future career and GIRLS. I know how precious those little moments are when he comes to me unprevoked to give a little hug or kiss.

    The issues of loss and contentment have played a profound place in my life. I lost my mother in physical form when I was 12 but gained a far deeper connection with her( the one that I longed for through the time I had with her) only after she passed away.

    I am looking forward to reading Katrina’s work.

  20. I started this book just 24 hours ago and am already many chapters in. Like all of her books, it is so imminently readable. I have already underlined many of the passages you mention, especially the one about staying being its own kind of journey. That is a particularly resonant theme for me right now. Beautiful review, as always.

  23. i am in awe of the grace life offers, moment by moment… i really needed to read this post today. i really needed to hear of this amazing author, and her wonderful book. thank you for being the conduit of this grace.

  25. The Gift of an Ordinary Day has been on my wish list for too long. Your glowing endorsement and has motivated me to have it sent today! And the chance to “win” Kenison’s next book? Bonus!

  26. Wow, your review is simply beautiful! I can’t wait to read Magical Journey as I am in a similar phase of life – empty-nester, mid-age and reinventing myself (building a coaching business). I read Ordinary Days and fell in love with her writing. It touches the deepest felt chords and speaks my own words. I’m looking to read the words to my life in her new book now. I too focus a lot (maybe too much) on the passage of time and impermanence of it all.
    Thank you for this wonderful review.

  27. I have often been thankful that souls like Katrina travel just a bit ahead of me in this life, and share what they see back over their shoulders to me. Thanks for providing this lovely review, as it enhances my eagerness to read Magical Journey.

  28. I continue to be moved and grateful for writers like you and Katrina, who articulate and help me understand some of my deepest feelings. Thank you for sharing books, poems and pieces that inspire you – I look forward to reading Magical Journey.

  29. I can’t wait to read Katrina’s book. I’ve pre-ordered from Amazon, but would love to have a signed copy of her book. How wonderful that Katrina is your mentor and friend. An amazing gift from the universe.

    Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Lindsey.

  31. I am almost finished with Gift of an Ordinary Day and I love it! I have 2 boys, one a senior in high school this year. Katina has given voice to all the feelings I am experiencing. I would LOVE to win her new book to see where the next few years after “Ordinary Day” have taken her!

  33. In two serendipitous days I have discovered your writing, and through you, the books of Katrina Keniston. What gifts! I am struggling with all these things on my own journey: change, loss, redefining and reinventing joy and meaning after being confronted with the realization that I am squarely in what is commonly called “the second half of life.” So glad to have discovered such wise and eloquent guides to living in the moment and savoring life.

  34. What a beautiful review of Katrina’s book Magical Journey! As I expressed in my email, your writing touches me deeply every day. I thank you for introducing me to Katrina’s writing and now get that also. I am 71 and still on my spiritaul journey,always eager for more understanding and more ways to share life.
    I would be so touched to have a signed copy of Katrina’s book to read and treasure. How special! Either way, I look forward to reading her book. It is definitely a muct on my list.

  35. I appreciate so much that you and Katrina are both willing to recognize the dichotomy of living and aging that you describe in the final paragraphs of this post. So often I feel guilty for this everyday sadness I feel regarding fleeting beauty. The sadness that my newlywedded bliss might fade, or that my beloved dog will not be with me forever. Sometimes I find it crippling, but that’s only because of the immense joy those things give to me. I value your kindred perception on this *so much.* More than I can say. Perhaps rather than guilt, I should embrace and celebrate these feelings. I cannot wait, at your recommendation, to read Katrina’s book. Winning a copy would be such a blessing! Thanks for this post.

  36. I saw the video a week or so before Christmas and I loved it enough to pass the link on to several friends. I can’t wait to read the book as I prepare myself for a big transition…my oldest child leaves for college in another year and a half. Just thinking about it makes me a little breathless!

  38. You had me at: “Katrina and I share the same preoccupation with impermanence; our spirits circle around a similar wound, which has to do with how quickly this life flies by, and with how irreplaceable these days are.”

    And then: “She describes the particular, poignant reality of life with small children at home and I weep, because while I am in those years, right now, I am already mourning them.”

    Truly, I know just what you mean. I will offer you this glimpse from the other side of life with small children: There are other things waiting for you that you can’t know now. They are not better than, but not worse than, either. Just different. Life continues to be exquisitely, painfully beautiful. The mourning–because it is here, too–is not constant, and it, strangely, a source of joy.

    I look forward to reading this book–thanks for pointing us to it.

  41. I read Katrina’s last two books while on winter break from my job as a teacher as my family skied down Vermont mountains….I look forward to reading MAGICAL JOURNEY (perhaps an autographed copy??? LOL) while on this year’s winter break…however my family is now grown and on their own…

  42. “Mitten Strings” and “Ordinary Day” have brought me comfort and hope through the journey of motherhood. I cannot wait to read “Magical Journey” and see what is in store!

    Thank you for your lovely, lyrical review.

  43. Am so anxious to read her new book. I have read all of Katrina’s books and loved them. I have had the experience of being with my best friend as she struggled to die. What a humbling experience. I can’t wait to read the Magical Journey. Thank you for your post about her new book. I know I will love it. Peace.

  44. I look forward to immersing myself in the new book. I cried tear after tear reading her last book on an Aruba beach as it was our “last” family vacation before sending my eldest off to college. Now in the throes of college apps and decisions with my youngest, I feel the tug of the next chapter of my life. — the empty nest and the reality of being 50 ( what a number! ) — fully expect more tears, but am anxious to soak in her beautiful words!

  45. As I read your blog, I’m thinking, this is how I feel, but don’t know how to express. I first listened to an audio version of An Ordinary Day while driving back and forth to out of town Dr. Appointments. I loved the book so much, I purchased a copy and String Mittens For God, and sent an email to Ms Katrina Keniston telling her how much her book touched my heart and thanking her. First time in my life I sent a TY message to a someone of such importance and had never met. (She kindly responded, I might add.)
    Now I can’t wait to get a copy of this new book, as I have retired from 40+yrs of being an RN, daughter married, and I’m alone, needing to redefine myself and purpose. I’m struggling and I know her book will be helpful. Very timely. Thank you for this vehicle to share my thoughts. Linda

  46. Thank you for this review, and the link to the video about this book. I am a counsellor and love the way writing such as you describe – and yours, too – feed my work.

  47. I loved The Gift of an Ordinary Day and I am looking forward to reading this new book! My son, a high school senior, is headed off to college in the fall and I am acutely aware of each passing moment. Katrina Kenison’s powerful words speak right to my heart! I follow her on Facebook and that is how I discovered your blog, Lindsey. I am so looking forward to reading more from you as well as Ms. Kenison! Thanks!

  48. I would love to receive a signed copy from Katrina, as my pre-ordered copy could then be given to a very dear friend who lost her wonderful son, age 34, to a sudden death heart attack, on a Sunday afternoon, when he went out fishing in a boat. He simply quit breathing and slumped down into the boat. He moved to Heaven in the blink of an eye! My husband died the same way. Together we have become much closer friends now since we share so deeply the ‘harsh realities’ of life and death.
    But even if I am not chosen for a signed copy, I will still give her my copy to read as soon as I have finished it…….

  50. Looking forward to reading a book that means this much to you.

    Also re: coffee shop randomness . . . I think that means there’s hope for you and Lowry!

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