Books

Well, I couldn't stand it any longer. I felt like writing. And as my arm is still healing, and in a restricted brace, typing, though slow and tedious, writing with a pen is far more difficult, will have to be the mode of this missive.




I was just reading favorite blogs, and two of them got my brain stirring. They were about books. I love books! I love to read as well as collect them. Though as a child, I was more often than not outside, jumping out of the hay loft, trying to ride sheep, or hanging upside down in the lilac bush, (yes, it was big enough to support a child, due to its age). But sit and read!? Only for school assignments. There were a couple of years I read the same book, about Dolly Madison, to write a book report. Even in high school, being a slow reader, when having to read a book for lit class, would read the preface, the first several chapters, a few in the middle and the last few, ask my best friend about the rest and pray for essay questions.




Yes, this is me hanging from the afore mentioned lilac bush.

It wasn't till my second daughter went to kindergarten, and I had time on my hands, that I began to read, really read, and found I liked it, a lot! Please understand that I grew up around books, my parents and siblings are all readers. My mother tried to get me to read books. I would start them, but rarely finish them. There were trees to climb!

My uncle, now retired, was the head librarian at a university in New Jersey. He often would send us kids books on whatever our interests were at any given time. In high school, for me it was art. He sent me wonderful books, which due to major moves in my life, I no longer have, but oh, what joy to open those boxes that had traveled so many miles across the country just for me.




I have lots of books I have collected over the years, some just because they were pretty to look at, others because they were favorite authors. I bought one book for a dollar just because I liked the title. The cover was in horrid condition, but I got it anyway. I finally read it a year later, and now it is a favorite. Elizabeth and her German Garden, by Elizabeth Von Arnim. I have read it just about every spring since April 1996. I think I have gotten my dollars worth.

One dollar find, now treasure.

My favorite author is Fay Inchfawn. She was a British woman, who wrote quite a lot; poetry, prose, biographical books of their daily lives in Britain and my all time favorite book, The Life Book of Mary Watt. It is a novel about a young girl on the family farm and her personal struggle with her relationship with the Lord. I love the book, because that struggle mirrors my own struggle as a teenage girl. I have many of her books, though most are well out of print and those still around live across the pond.

My Fay Inchfawn collection.

I love to read and take strength from the words penned by those who have trodden the path before me, whether in poetry, prose, or the details of their daily lives. How mighty the written word. How one phrase, can make all the difference in our mood or thought or behavior. How many books have become friends, companions on sunny or rainy days. How I miss reading to my girls, yet what joy to have my small grandson bring a book and climb in my lap so that I can read it to him.

Paper and inch. Who would have thought that just the touch and smell of it could raise ones pulse.