I have found many gifts in the pages of a book.
Green Eggs and Ham gave me the love of reading. Being able to read by myself was such a joy. I learned to read that book by listening to it on cassette, turning the pages when the musical “tink” sounded, and putting the sound I was hearing together with the text I was reading until, after many many repetitions, I knew that “I am Sam, Sam I am” was what those words meant. Words meant something. Amazing.
I learned to be a friend by reading a book called,
Balcony People. I read this book back in my original Amway days (yep, I fell for Amway not once, but twice) It’s funny, because I have re-read this book, not in an Amway sense, but as a free thinking adult, and the lesson I have always attributed to this book is not what this book is about at all. Does this really matter? What I took from it on the first run through has made me the friend I am. One that stands in the balcony of my friends and cheers them on. Knowing when to be quiet, and when to cheer louder. Again, this is not at all what this book is about, but it is what I made it about.
Another book that gave a huge gift to me is
The Physician by Noah Gordon. This book gave me an acceptance of my religious beliefs. Growing up, I was a very firm Christian. Matter of fact, I couldn’t wait to turn 16 so I could get my driver’s license so I could drive myself to church on Wednesdays and Sundays. Someone challenged my blind acceptance to the faith I had so heartily swallowed as a child. I will always thank him for that. My beliefs have become very eclectic, but that Baptist upbringing still nagged at some spot in my brain that I was wrong, going to hell, blah, blah, blah. While the book
The Physician is not about religion per se, the main character in this story pretends to be Jewish to get an education, and when he confesses to his best friend that he is not Jewish, his friend feels so betrayed. Upon thinking about this situation, his friend goes from feeling betrayed to fearing for his friend’s soul, to acceptance of his friend’s differing path. He sees the after life and describes his understanding of things by describing “The Here After” as an island, and there are many bridges that span from this world to the next, and everyone can get there, they just take a different bridge. I could now accept that everyone can have a different path. I can have a different path. What a gift I found in the pages of that book.
The greatest gift I have found in the pages of a book, literally were between the pages of a book. Recently my husband, son and I went to see
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. After seeing this movie, I thought it might be fun to read the series again, so I picked up the first book. I had read it when it first came out, in the late 90’s. Now, I am a purest when it comes to book. I treat them with respect, unable to underline a text book, or mare a page. I certainly would never bend a page over as a book mark. This being so, I use all kinds of things for bookmarks. Sometimes it’s a bank receipt, and insert from a magazine, a Kleenex or a gum wrapper. I opened
Harry Potter and the Sourcer’s Stone and found the bookmark I had left there, and I cried. It was a picture, just a snapshot. It was from my wedding reception, and it was a picture of my mom and me. Smiles as bright as the sun, looking so much alike, looking so much like friends. She looks good, healthy; not like in my wedding pictures (we were married in August, but did not hold our reception until November). I used this bookmark for the entire Harry Potter series, propping my Mom up so I could glance at her as I read. The greatest gift I ever got from a book was not in the words, but in between the pages, and it was a present I left for myself. A memory, a smile, a warm loving feeling from my mom.
