THINGS I LEARNED FROM BOOKCLUB

After six years in book club, I have learned a few things from being in the club.

1. How to pick a book for a group to read.  It is a talent picking a book that a group will like and that a group can discuss in depth.  It doesn't have to be a book that the group ultimately likes but they have to like it enough to want to read it and therefore choose it initially.  Whether they ultimately like it, well that is always up for grabs.
2. How to not be a nay-sayer. There are a couple of Nay-Sayers in the group. When they make their point they frequently start with "no, I think..."  I feel that puts down the other people in the group.  I like to give my opinion without disagreeing with their opinion.  They don't have to be wrong for me to have my opinion.
3. People like certain types of books and gravitate toward them.  Our book club reads all sorts of books but there are a few people who always gravitate toward the same type of book.  The same type of writing.  The long prose with flowery sentences that have long descriptions of a thing.  Like a paragraph describing a cloud.  That type of writing drives me crazy.  I like to read for fun and not to learn something or to spend an hour reading a description about a flower.
4. Some people like to talk only about the book and others like to add information their personal experiences.  

It is funny to be a group.  I am usually not a joiner.  In my job it makes it makes it difficult for me to be a joiner.  I am also not a joiner anyway.  I never joined a gym.  No team sports once I was out of school.  No groups.  The most I did was volunteer.  In college I joined a few things but I was always the outsider in the group.  Even in high school I was the person who was in the group but was so far out on the fringe and was in so many groups, no one claimed me.   I was in a lot of yearbook group photos.

Anyway, the decision continues.  Do I stay with the group or do I drop out?  I think I stick it out for now. There are only three more meetings this year.  I like the two new members so maybe they will tip the balance.
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I cooked a fantastic pasta salad today.  It is Pasta Salad with Roasted Broccoli.  It tastes delicious.  The broccoli tastes so rich when roasted.  Yum!

Until tomorrow...