BELATED HAPPY NEW YEAR

Shortly after my last post I went into Holiday Sale mode at the bookstore followed by long days of inventory. Somewhere in there was New Year's Eve and we were in 2008. Oh wow! This should be quite a year in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

The Friday after New Year's Day, my husband and I got in the car and drove to Sedona, AZ, where we spent a week of bliss. I had never been there before and was expecting a lot but it was beyond that. We hiked, in rain and sun; we ate and drank wine; we slept and did the other thing you do in bed; we watched movies and read books.

It just smells good wherever you go in Sedona. The best place for breakfast (we went there three times) is the Coffeepot Restaurant, just below Coffeepot Rock, where they have 100 different omelets and the most amazing biscuits I have ever tasted. We learned to say, "What is the name of that rock?" and we were filled with the energy of the vortex.

I found the good bookstore in town, called The Well Red Coyote, which is owned and run by a former resident of Los Angeles. Just in time, the Images of America series had released a book on Sedona, which I bought and read to learn the history of the place. Sedona was a woman who came to the area with her husband in 1901. In front of the very fine Sedona Public Library is a bronze statue of Sedona Schnebly.

I read all 601 pages of Simone de Beauvoir's The Mandarins while we were there. Most of that book takes place in Paris, France, the location of my last big trip. It is an excellent story and gave me a look at the way many French people viewed America and the Marshall Plan in the postwar years. In these days of very American politics, it was refreshing to look at how it goes in another country and to see that everywhere there are people who want freedom and ideals just as much as we do.

I could go on and on but I will just say that all my New Year's plans and resolutions seemed entirely possible after such a fine journey and vacation. Here's to a year of great reading and keeping the wisdom.

Coming tomorrow is the popular Judy's Top Books read in the past year.