"Wouldn't it be fun if all the castles in the air which we make could come true and we could live in them?" ~Jo March

I am in a Norman Rockwell stage. I've been spending time looking through a huge book of his work, and was delighted to find his Louisa May Alcott series. The above picture is, simply, "Jo March in the Attic".

I love "Little Women". I remember how thrilling it was to discover that there were other books after it..."Little Men", "Jo's Boys", etc....but nothing ever replaced that original story of four sisters in my esteem.

This painting makes me smile because it reminds me of how desperately I wanted to be Jo March - feisty and brave, locked away in some special spot reserved for writing and imagining the rest of the world. (I think that a part of me could very well turn into a hermit, lost in an internal world. This may be the reason God decided I needed a family so early. So that I couldn't become the proverbial crazy cat lady. [at least not yet.]) When Jo finally got those stories published, but couldn't be proud of them, I was so torn for her - wanting her success to be truly admirable, for her to be happy with it...and then there's her book at the end, after the grief of losing Beth....I wanted to write something like that, too. Something with meaning, something special. Something to be proud of.

Thinking about "Little Women" takes me back to that wonderful phase of childhood...that time when I could just lie around and devour books by the pile. I had this great reading and diary-writing spot -- not in an attic like Jo, but outside on this big wooden swing in a corner of our yard. It was shaded by some wild trees covered in kudzu and angled so that I didn't feel exposed to the world. I named it something like 'Windy Hill.' I had a great penchant for naming places after L.M. Montgomery came into my brain. I also wrote out my diary entries to 'Kitty' for a few years after reading Anne Frank. I was, um, quite an impressionable kid, apparently.

But maybe it was more than that - I think, by trying to imitate these great people and characters, I was attempting to bring some of their magic into my life. Because that's what great books still do for me - they remind me that even the ordinary moments can be sacred...they make me want to have purpose and to aspire for greatness. They make me look at the daily within the larger picture...and to know that it's the scenes - the dialogue, the day to day action - that make up an entire life. So to infuse the knowledge that it all counts, even the small stuff, for the greater meaning of my life...it makes a difference in how I look at this house with the toys from scattered on the floor, the stray cat stretched out asleep on the back porch, the cell phone ringing in the next room.
The fact that there are books in this world that can make someone savor life more...that bring on a smile....it feels like such an extravagant gift!

Thanks to Laura

The Little House on the Prairie series was the first I ever read by myself...I can't remember how old I was, but I remember how much I loved following Laura's adventures. The wagons and wide prairies and cozy nights tucked in with the sound of Pa's music - it all thrilled me. The books spurred much of my early 'pretend' playing and influenced my choices throughout childhood...such as my insistence that my sister and I name our bikes so that they could be our 'horses'....and many, many, many games of 'pioneer'. Following the Little House books, I began to read more pioneer stories written for kids...and then fell in love with books by Janette Oke (this was also because of my lovely grandmothers, who both let me raid their bookshelves and taught me by example that books are to be loved). The majority of Janette Oke's Christian books are set in the 1800s and gave me the grown up's perspectives of those courageous settlers.

I was thinking about all of this because I unpacked long-closed boxes of books from those days and kept taking out book after book with this theme...(though Laura's books have been safely on my shelves, most of my childhood reading materials have been packed up in the garage)...it makes me smile, to think of how ready I was for some adventure of my own (and how much I longed to live in a dugout by a creek).

I looked up the Laura Ingalls books this morning and found that they've been remarketed for the younger generations....which is good. I hope I can pass this love of mine down to my own kids...especially if I ever have a girl. Because Laura Ingalls is definitely full of girls-can-do-anything antecdotes. Here's a cool list of recipes and activies drawn from the books - all fun ideas!

I'm glad my parents gave me those books so long ago...they opened up an entire world with that simple gift.

In a Fairy-Tale-ish Sort of Mood

During a recent trip to the movies, I saw a preview for Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass. This was a book I received as a gift waaaaay back in 1997 (I know this for sure from the inscription, which begins 'to the girl who always has her nose in a book'. Apparently a decade hasn't changed me all that much). It's fantasy and is the first book in Pullman's trilogy - which, unfortunately, I never finished reading.

I pulled the book out and reread it last night. There are things I didn't know to catch as a thirteen year old, such as the fact that these books are drawn from Milton's Paradise Lost and the controversial subject matter of the Dust, which is supposedly related to original sin. I can't elaborate on that without finishing the books - many mysteries were left unsolved in the first installment. But The Golden Compass is full of adventure and it was fun getting caught up in it again...

As I read it, I realized that it has been a long time since I have read a novel that is purely fantasy. I've reread Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy and Lewis' Narnian books in the past couple of years, but that's about it. It's odd, because as a kid I loved Madeleine L'Engle's science fiction books and I remember devouring Ursela Le Guin's Earthsea series...I think that I have this idea of grown-up fantasy/sci-fi books as books filled with vampires and werewolves and badly written cliches, which doesn't make me want to read them.

I'm hoping that I have misinformed myself...because I enjoy stepping into worlds different from my own and I'm sure that children's literature doesn't have a complete monopoly on good literary fantasy.

So I'm hoping to expand my reading list - if you have any suggestions, please let me know!

The Post In Which There Is A Sundry of Items

A In Which The Day Quickly Fades

These were my thoughts when I woke up this morning: I'll get the boys dressed, run over for a quick playdate with their pal Xander, run to the store to finish up Easter necessities (a dozen eggs to color, for one extremely important item), and I'll be home by 3:30 to clean house and have a few hours for reading/playing with Sean's castle/catching up on blogs/etc., etc. etc.
What is it that they say about the best laid plans?
For one thing, I usually underestimate the time it's going to take to get all three of us out of the house. It doesn't take me that long to get dressed and ready to go...but then there are the juice cups to grab, the extra Pull-ups to remember, oh - that box of clothes for Xander, and I know I put my phone down somewhere....
Anyway, by the time everything was packed up in the car (including children), it was almost eleven o'clock. Playtime was fun - we went outside for a while, where their azalea bushes are crazy in bloom, and watched as three kids three and under attempted to play nicely.
We left about two and entered the realm of Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart on a holiday weekend. What was I thinking? Especially about myself, because if I had taken the time to honestly say - I have the hardest time making up my mind about which particular grass to buy for Easter baskets or what color, exactly, I need new toddler socks to be...I might have just gone on home and ventured out after dark when the boys were at home with Neil after his dress rehearsal for the Easter play. But I didn't think it through and so the time-sucking fangs of Wal-Mart - won, yet again.
And when I had just gotten to the register - after waiting for twenty minutes in line - I got this call from Neil:
N- "Hey, where are you?"
me - "Checking out. Finally."
N - "Real quick, get out of line. I need some solid red shorts to go underneath my costume for tonight."
me - "Um. What?"
N - "Solid red shorts. Not too baggy. And not with any markings. To go under the soldier costume."
me - "That's what I thought you said."


Three stores later, I found the appropriate shorts. He has a solo in which he ends up kneeling, so the shorts really were needed, and needed by six pm...but wow. Not the afternoon the kids were looking for, to say the least. They were remarkably well behaved, though, so we all rewarded ourselves with a chocolate chip cookie and Hi-C fruit punch from Subway.
It was well after six o'clock by the time we pulled up in the driveway and by the time I had cleaned up the kitchen, found the rest of Neil's costume stuff, and boiled eggs for coloring later on tonight...it was somehow dark-thirty.


B, In Which Two Sentences Exhibit the Joy of A Carrie-Friend

1. She made double banana pudding, just so she could share.
2. She voluntarily helped me to tuck my newly planted flowers in for the night, to protect them from the frost - literally, under light sheets...and she didn't make me feel that crazy for doing it.


C, In Which I Discuss Reading, Writing, and a Resolution

I've taken a few days off from the novel-writing, to splurge in a bit of a reading-fest. I'm so excited about all of the books lying around the house (from a used-book store run and the library on Tuesday) that it's been way too hard to stick to just one book...I've found myself trying to read five at the same time. You don't, um, get too far like that. I've found that when working on the novel gets a bit frustrating (as it was earlier this week), a good book binge is helpful fuel. I totally and completely concur with that age-old wisdom - if you want to write, you must read. For me, it's especially essential in a dry spell. When I read some really good writing, it makes me excited about language again...it makes me want to try my own hand at the craft.
Anyway, my frustrated post reaped some encouragement, which was much needed and appreciated...and it inspired me to make a decision - I'm going to try to get up an hour earlier than everybody else, at least every other day, for solid writing time. Not a terribly innovative idea, but one that's been difficult to carry out, since...I'm, um, fond of my pillow. I usually don't get to bed until late, so the early morning (pre-kids waking up) thing is something I should probably already be doing but haven't had the will power to try. I figure if I make a public intention to do it, I might be more prone to follow through. So you've seen it here- my way-past-new-year's resolution.

D, In Which I Am Excited About Proust!

So Luisa over at http://www.novembrance.blogspot.com/ posted an entry about how she and a friend were going to re-read In Search of Lost Time, the classic series by Proust. I have never read Proust before, and she piqued my interest with her description and obvious excitement. I checked out Swann's Way and by page two realized that I was definitely going to have to read the entire series. Anyway, we have a page so that we can all discuss the books as we read along...if you're interested in reading the books with us, or just in checking out the discussion, head over to http://www.teaandmadeleines.blogspot.com/.

E, In Which I Ramble About the Nature of Hope

A certain wonderful friend of mine had some high hopes sort of dashed against glaring rocks yesterday. And I've been trying to come up with something comforting to say to her, because I know that she's feeling a bit down...this is all I've managed to come up with.

Hope is a strange thing. We try not to do it sometimes, in order to save ourselves from disappointment (though it's usually still there, down in the basement with the lights turned off and the deadbolt locked)...it's an emotion of anticipation, of belief that the things that we want or need are morphing into reality. When those things don't actually materialize, we can feel let down. Angry that we let ourselves get worked up....maybe even sort of foolish, for indulging in expectation. We tell ourselves that we won't let it happen again - we will work on lowering our expectations.
Don't do it. If we stop hoping - especially when it comes to attaining our dreams - then we are essentially taking away a bit of the belief we hold in ourselves. If you lower your expectations, then you're robbing yourself of greater opportunities...and I know that good-hearted, hard-working people are deserving and capable of handling these greater opportunities. And even if it takes longer than expected, they will come. Don't lose a propensity to hope for marvelous things...sometimes we have to hold onto faith in the unexpected, in the out-of-nowhere grace that life can give. Hope has gotten us to where we are now, in one way or another. It'll get us to the next place.

and F, In Which I Say "So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye"

(The Sound of Music is on ABC Family all weekend, starting tonight.) So..."I flit, I float, I fleetly flee, I fly. The sun has gone to bed and so must I..."