Hollyworld: Enough is as good as a feast.

Tuesday, February 22, 2022

Enough is as good as a feast.

I've been working on my family tree again. For a long time, I thought just my maternal relatives came from PA. But it turns out a number of my paternal branches started their lives in the US in Pennsylvania. So many of their stories have been lost, but I do know they came to Pennsylvania for freedom—they were Mennonites and Quakers looking for a place to worship as they saw fit and William Penn's woods offered them a chance for that.

My cottage is deep in Amish and Mennonite country. I know a bit about their religion. But I didn't know much about Quakers...so of course I bought a book.

I will confess, I love used books...they come with a history. My favorites are those that are marked up with notes and highlights from those who read them before me. So I found a book...How the Quakers Invented America (David Youst). It's a simple book about a simple people. "Enough is as good as a feast," is a line that caught my eye—and I was obviously not the first one to notice it.

So much of my life (and my posts online) are about simple things. A beautiful sunrise. A walk in the woods. A day in the studio. Tallulah and her antics.

My life centers around my family and those simple things. They're what gives me glee. And those simple things are everything. I think that's my magic power...I know what matters. My family and those simple things. I have to wonder if some of those people from so far long ago left me with that knowledge buried deep in my mitochondrial DNA. Enough is as good as a feast. Yes, it resonated with me.

That love of simple-things is there in my books. They're not big epic tomes, they're small stories about regular people. They're about people who know enough is as good as a feast. The greatest compliment anyone's ever given me about my books is, I wish she was my best friend.

I think Harry in my new book, A View to a Kiln, is that kind of character. The book opens with her husband telling her he's not happy and leaving her. That moment is a turning point for Harry. She realizes she deserves to be happy as well and changes her life...for the better. That is until she finds a dead body in her kiln!

I hope you check it out, and I hope you take a moment today to look at the little things in your life that give you glee!!

Holly

PS I'm posting this on TwosDAY...2-22-22. It's a simple thing that has had me smiling all day!!