Booklists

One of my most beloved books as a child, which I still have to this day, is "Wildcat" by Sherry De Volld Ball. My mother bought the book for me in 1956 when I was five years old, because she knew that I loved cats. The story is unusual in that, near the end of the book, the "wildcat" of the title, a feral cat named Amber, is hit by a car. This was a stark contrast to the syrupy-sweet themes of most children's books of that era. The story teaches an important lesson in acceptance. I read the book to my son several times when he was little, and he always laughed at me because I always couldn't keep from crying when I came to the part where the mother in the story broke the news to her little girl about her beloved pet being killed. It still makes me cry to this day! But it is a wonderful and timeless story, with a happy and uplifting ending.

In elementary school, I delighted in all types of poetry. Favorite Poems Old and New Selected for Boys and Girls by Helen Ferris (Doubleday & Company) copyright 1957. I had quite a crush on Walter de la Mare, Edgar Allan Poe and Alfred Lloyd Tennyson. I had a very good memory and would read the poems over and over again to myself. As a child, I wasn't allowed to cross the street without adult supervision. But I was very eager to share my poems with the world; so I used to sit on the curb in front of our house and wait to see who would pass. About once a week, our neighbor across the street would mow his lawn. This was an excellent opportunity for me to set down my poetry book on our freshly mowed lawn and scream out my memorized poems to Mr Hunt from my position on the curb. It gave me great satisfaction to educate him – and I do remember a friendly wave from the other side of the street.

My parents read to me every night and soon I was reciting from my personal favorite, Froggie went a-Courting by John Langstaff. I knew the book by heart and if my Mother skipped one word, one page – I would howl in pain. I had to hear the entire story and since the book was also based on a song, after listening, I needed to sing the song the book was based upon. Years later, my mother told me that I drove her crazy and she seriously considered frog-icide! (Umm hum!)

When I was about 3 years old, my older sister decided that I should disappear. So she piled all her books on top of me in my playpen. My mother has a Polaroid snapshot of my tiny head poking up between the books. For my sister, it was a disaster. For me, it was the start of my life-long love affair with books. In elementary school I read with fascination about animals that could talk before I moved on to biographies of famous Americans and the adventures of Nancy Drew and the Bobbsey Twins. In high school, I shielded myself from shyness by holding Leo Tolstoy and Irving Stone in my arms rather than holding hands with boys. For the last 20 years, I have been a member of various book clubs and explored titles that I never would have discovered on my own and met people who would have remained strangers to me except for our common love of books.

Even in this age of online news and e-books, I am never tempted to stray from old-fashioned paper book reading. The little smears of coffee or chocolate that sometimes stain the pages or the dog-ears that once marked my place are all reminders that this book is mine and it has been read. The weight of carrying a book in my purse (knowing that I’ve packed two more in my luggage, just in case) provides me a comfortable feeling of having enough. There aren’t many things in life that can consistently provide that level of satisfaction.