Taking a deep breath

If going climbing (all the two times I've done it) has taught me anything apart from the need to keep my nails short, it's that there are so many things in the past that I've turned down because the idea scared me, or took me out of my comfort zone, that I'm actually wondering how many good things I've missed. How many things have I said no to because it 'wasn't my sort of thing', or made me nervous? 

I've seen the film Yes, Man, and okay, it was kind of daft, but it has a point. I love the title of the book Feel the Fear And Do It Anyway, although I've not actually read it, I'm ashamed to say, and that's something I must remedy over the Summer holidays. (Yes, tomorrow is the last day of term. Excuse me while I just run around celebrating...) Lately, I have tried to attempt things rather than just feebly say, 'Well, I'm not sure...'. 

I took on the running of the school library although I seriously thought I was not worthy. And despite the equivalent of a month spent sitting at the computer, cataloguing books, I'm glad I took it on. I've had children asking for book recommendations, I've shared a great series of books with The Bookworm in year 5 (The Spiderwick Chronicles, in case you're interested, complete with field-guide). I've even been lent books by said Bookworm, and am thoroughly enjoying being immersed in reading material and having book-centred chats with the children. The Boss Lady seems to think I'm doing okay, so I should stop worrying. I'm doing this for the children, so bugger the rest of them who are moaning about messed-up time-tables for library visits. Getting children reading is important to me. Mainly so I can borrow their books. 

I said yes to climbing, and I've raved about it so much that Son Number Two wants to give it a go. But the thing I'm most pleased about diving into was Open University. It was three years ago now, and I was only going to do one interesting-looking course on psychology, but now I'm just two courses away from my degree. Every time I sign up for the next course, I'm scared that I'm going to make a fool of myself, but it always seems to go okay. I'll find out how Children's Literature and Creative Writing went in a couple of weeks, but so far I'm on target for a 2:1, which would make me pretty happy. 

I've not always succeeded in my 'give it a go' outlook. Sorry, Ms Fab, your birthday spa-day looked great, but I couldn't do it. Give me a slap next year and force me to go. So, what will I do? I will do Na-No-Wri-Mo this year. Fifty-thousand words in a month. I can do that. It'll be a great way to avoid doing linguistics assignments. The blog may be rather sparse in November, though. What else? I will make phone calls. The Husband is a wonderful phone-caller, but I rely on him too much. He'll come in tired from work, and I'll have a list of calls I need him to make. As a recovering stammerer, phones are my nemesis but, bloody hell, I'm nearly 44, I should be making my own phone calls. 

Funnily enough, whilst writing this, I was checking through my blogroll (on the right, my list of the best blogs I've found) and Lessons in French has a post on the same subject. Read it here, it's much better than mine. Not sure if I could bring myself to bungee jump off a bridge, though.