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Favorite books: Anathem (Neil Stephenson), Here if You Need Me (Anne Braestrup), Gilead (Marilynne Robinson), Snow Crash (Neil Stephenson)

Favorite music: Juno soundtrack, Waiting for My Real Life to Begin (Colin James Hay), anything by Ray Lamontagne, Daughter (Loudon Wainwright), the Weepies, Afraid of Heights (Espen Lind), Little Wonders (Rob Thomas), American Prayer (Dave Stewart)

Favorite foods: Australian red licorice from Trader Joe’s, Starbucks vanilla scones, Armando’s pizza, my homemade chocolate sauce

Favorite drinks: Diet Coke, Starbucks skim latte, Oyster Bay sauvignon blanc

Favorite movie: Slumdog Millionaire

I am welling over this New Year’s Eve day, full of feelings that are as inarticulate as they are powerful. I feel skinless and sad and a little bit buffeted by all the things in my heart. Time is passing and I am still not able to live in it the way I wish I could. I hope I will be able to put into words all the things I am thinking about, but for now I can muster only two quotations that echo today:

The longest journey is the journey inwards. – Dag Hammerskjold

We have it in our power to begin the world over again. – Thomas Paine

These two are really starting to be friends. Today Grace convinced Whit to jump into the pool for the first time, his condition being that he wanted to hold her hand as he did so.

Reporting from Bonita Springs. It is hot and sunny. Matt is playing a lot of golf and Grace, Whit and I are doing a lot of playing. That is to say: biking, swimming, riding the elevator up and down, eating PB&J, watching movies.

Am about to finish an excellent book of short stories by Ursula Leguin called Changing Planes.

All of the grandparents respected my explicit request that Christmas be materially low-key, which is terrific.

I am finally feeling better – some combination of good sleep, inhaler, z-pack, and sunshine (in that order, I suspect) has sent my cough packing.

Have been running the last 2 days and it is hard. I guess at 34 you can’t take a month off and just hop back into it. Ugh. Feeling tired and old!

Grace and Whit have befriended the 5 and 7 year old grandchildren of the couple in the other condo on the 19th floor. Whose names are Andrew and Alex, much to G&W’s thrill (the same names as their dearly beloved friends in Cambridge). This new friendship means, in practice, that I am spending a lot of time with Andrew and Alex’s grandfather, who is a very nice 65 year old named Mike.

That’s all of the exciting news there is to report.