A Preview of Bittersweet

Bittersweet is the practice of believing that we really do need both the bitter and the sweet, and that a life of nothing but sweetness rots both your teeth and your soul.  Bitter is what makes us strong, what forces us to push through, what helps us earn the lines on our faces and the calluses on our hands.  Sweet is nice enough, but bittersweet is beautiful, nuanced, full of depth and complexity.  Bittersweet is courageous, gutsy, earthy.

Happy Labor Day!  Today, I am thrilled to introduce you to Shauna Niequist, a dear friend and incredible writer.  On Wednesday, I will be hosting a Giveaway of Shauna's second release, Bittersweet: Thoughts on Change, Grace, and Learning the Hard Way.  I have been asked to review the book, and then the winner will receive a free, signed copy!  Can't wait!

Although I wish I could quote you all of my favorite parts of the book, and chat about it over coffee, reading this excerpt from Bittersweet will have to do for today!

Share your life with the people you love, even if it means saving up for a ticket and going without a few things for a while to make it work.  There are enough long lonely days of the same old thing, and if you let enough years pass, and if you let the routine steamroll your life, you'll wake up one day, isolated and weary, and wonder what happened to all those old friends.  You'll wonder why all you share is Christmas cards, and why life feels lonely and bone-dry.  We were made to live connected and close, as close as we all were those few days in Alameda, holding one another's babies, taking turns stirring whatever's on the stove.


So walk across the street, or drive across town, or fly across the country, but don't let really intimate loving friendships become the last item on a long to-do list.  Good friendships are like breakfast.  You think you're too busy to eat breakfast, but then you find yourself exhausted and cranky halfway through the day, and discover that your attempt to save time totally backfired.  In the same way, you can try to go it alone because you don't have time or because your house is too messy to have people over, or because making new friends is like the very worst parts of dating.  But halfway through a hard day or a hard week, you'll realize in a flash that you're breathtakingly lonely, and that the Christmas cards aren't much company.  Get up, make a phone call, buy a cheap ticket, open your front door.


Because there really is nothing like good friends, like the sounds of their laughter and the tones of their voices and the things they teach us in the quietest, smallest moments.

How do you stay connected to old friends or the special people in your life?  
Come back Wednesday for the review and giveaway!