Still Life with Chickens:
Starting Over In a House by the Sea
By Catherine Goldhammer
ISBN: 978-0452288485
Library Call Number: 974.4043092 G6189s
Still Life with Chickens is a tale of coping with life changes. What happens when the vows a couple take at the altar fall short? Do we slog it out hanging on to a less than perfect life or do we pack it in?
We often don’t sense life changing because we are too busy living it. There is the job, the mortgage, the kids… endless demands on one’s time, money and emotions. Midlife is hard enough and is usually the time when people start taking stock of their lives. Sometimes one decides to focus on their dreams as an individual rather than as a couple and the spouse or partner is left behind, usually in bewilderment.
This book is a journey of recovery in which Catherine shares her experience with life after divorce. Like countless other women in her situation, she finds herself unable to afford the lifestyle she was accustomed to. Her goal becomes creating a new life for herself that will bring her some sort of peace and offer her twelve year old daughter stability. This brings compromises. The small cottage she chooses is a fixer that she can afford and she is investing in its possibilities. She also agrees to let her daughter raise a small flock of chickens. Both projects are undertaken in a learn-as-you-go fashion and life lessons are discovered at every turn. To me, mother and daughter are both fledglings, starting over in a house by the sea.
This book came into my hands in the book returns at the library following the Lit Chicks's visit to the farm. The title seemed appropriate. At the farm there were several varieties of new baby chicks happily chirping away in the living room brooder. We collected eggs from the mature birds that lived in the barn. Then I became intrigued by the synopsis on the flyleaf and decided to check it out. I found the story touching and look forward to her next book, Winging It: Dispatches from an (Almost) Empty Nest. (Library call number: 974.4043092 G6189W)
By Catherine Goldhammer
ISBN: 978-0452288485
Library Call Number: 974.4043092 G6189s
Still Life with Chickens is a tale of coping with life changes. What happens when the vows a couple take at the altar fall short? Do we slog it out hanging on to a less than perfect life or do we pack it in?
We often don’t sense life changing because we are too busy living it. There is the job, the mortgage, the kids… endless demands on one’s time, money and emotions. Midlife is hard enough and is usually the time when people start taking stock of their lives. Sometimes one decides to focus on their dreams as an individual rather than as a couple and the spouse or partner is left behind, usually in bewilderment.
This book is a journey of recovery in which Catherine shares her experience with life after divorce. Like countless other women in her situation, she finds herself unable to afford the lifestyle she was accustomed to. Her goal becomes creating a new life for herself that will bring her some sort of peace and offer her twelve year old daughter stability. This brings compromises. The small cottage she chooses is a fixer that she can afford and she is investing in its possibilities. She also agrees to let her daughter raise a small flock of chickens. Both projects are undertaken in a learn-as-you-go fashion and life lessons are discovered at every turn. To me, mother and daughter are both fledglings, starting over in a house by the sea.
This book came into my hands in the book returns at the library following the Lit Chicks's visit to the farm. The title seemed appropriate. At the farm there were several varieties of new baby chicks happily chirping away in the living room brooder. We collected eggs from the mature birds that lived in the barn. Then I became intrigued by the synopsis on the flyleaf and decided to check it out. I found the story touching and look forward to her next book, Winging It: Dispatches from an (Almost) Empty Nest. (Library call number: 974.4043092 G6189W)
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