A Year By The Sea: Thoughts Of An Unfinished Woman

Download Free (EPUB, PDF)

Now available in paperback, the entrancing story of how one woman's journey of self-discovery gave her the courage to persevere in re-creating her life. Also reaturing a reader's guide.Life is a work in progress, as ever-changing as a sandy shoreline along the beach. During the years Joan Anderson was a loving wife and supportive mother, she had slowly and unconsciously replaced her own dreams with the needs of her family. With her sons grown, however, she realized that the family no longer centered on the home she provided, and her relationship with her husband had become stagnant. Like many women in her situation, Joan realized that she had neglected to nurture herself and, worse, to envision fulfilling goals for her future. As her husband received a wonderful job opportunity out-of-state, it seemed that the best part of her own life was finished. Shocking both of them, she refused to follow him to his new job and decided to retreat to a family cottage on Cape Cod.At first casting about for direction, Joan soon began to take plea-sure in her surroundings and call on resources she didn't realize she had. Over the course of a year, she gradually discovered that her life as an "unfinished woman" was full of possibilities. Out of that magical, difficult, transformative year came A Year by the Sea, a record of her experiences and a treasury of wisdom for readers.This year of self-discovery brought about extraordinary changes in the author's life. The steps that Joan took to revitalize herself and rediscover her potential have helped thousands of woman reveal and release untapped resources within themselves.

Paperback: 208 pages

Publisher: Broadway Books; 1st Broadway Books Trade Pbk. Ed edition (August 15, 2000)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0767905938

ISBN-13: 978-0767905930

Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.5 x 8 inches

Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (352 customer reviews)

Best Sellers Rank: #23,525 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #7 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Regional U.S. > New England #43 in Books > Business & Money > Personal Finance > Retirement Planning #53 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Women's Studies > Feminist Theory

The writer of this book is absolutely irritating. The thought behind it -- excellent. I was actually jealous at the writer's ability to make a decision to take a year away from her marriage for reflection, and that she had the resources to do so. I relished the opportunity to curl up with her for a year, feeling sad, or happy, joyous or disappointed, as she wrote about her experience.Instead, I found my forcefully slamming the book down at times, and at other times, heaving deep sighs of irritation and annoyance. I thought Joan was a whiner who didn't appreciate the abundance of riches she had available to her, to even think about this experiment, let alone carry it out.Poor me, my marriage has grown stagnant. My children are grown. I'm lonely. I'm overweight. Join the club, sister. But, guess where you and most of your readers part company? Many of us are still slaving away at the 9-5 jobs which put food on the table and pay the rent or mortgage. We don't have options. We don't have Cape Cod getaway houses, multiple vehicles, royalty checks arriving, a savings account we can empty to make the leap, and a year of free time to write about our disappointments.I don't begrudge her what she had. I just wish she would have had more tact, class and dignity not to write from a place where she felt she had to constantly lament her life, when she had more abundance -- an embarrassment of riches, really -- in that little cottage and the option to retreat to it, than legions of sad and lonely married women have.I also have to hand it her to husband, estranged during this time, who took a few steps to make her grow up and stop whining. For instance, her cottage belonged to her family before she married and it came down through "her side of the family", not his.

A Year by the Sea: Thoughts of an Unfinished Woman Unfinished: Thoughts Left Visible Behind my eyes: thoughts of the average teen: thoughts of the average teen Eschatology, Messianism, and the Dead Sea Scrolls (Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature, V. 1) (Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls & Related Literature) I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts On Being A Woman Sagrada Familia: Gaudi's Unfinished Masterpiece Geometry, Construction and Site Dolly: My Life and Other Unfinished Business The Unfinished Reformation: What Unites and Divides Catholics and Protestants After 500 Years Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War Reconstruction Updated Edition: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 The Black Panthers: Portraits from an Unfinished Revolution Unfinished Conversations: Mayas and Foreigners Between Two Wars The Arab Uprising: The Unfinished Revolutions of the New Middle East Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 The Unfinished Nation: A Concise History of the American People Volume 1 The Unfinished Bombing: Oklahoma City in American Memory Einstein's Unfinished Symphony: Listening to the Sounds of Space-Time About Time: Einstein's Unfinished Revolution Harleys, Popes and Indian Chiefs: Unfinished Business of the Sixties Sissinghurst, An Unfinished History: The Quest to Restore a Working Farm at Vita Sackville-West's Legendary Garden