Throughout my life I have had an insatiable love of books, and I believe I have passed this down to my sons. Although their tastes go in different directions from nonfiction to Stephen King to historic maps to art and preservation. My intrigue remains among the fictional tales of love and mystery located in the present day or the past.
My fascination goes from Edgar Allan Poe to Nancy Drew. Yes, Nancy Drew. There is something about pulling one of those old childhood hardbacks down off the shelf in my breakfast room and flipping through the pages. Instantly memories of my childhood unfold of me nestled down in a pink handsewn quilt with the lamp light glowing next to my bed as I read about a bold teenage girl braving a haunted plantation. My heart still warms as I remember how I desperately wanted to identify with this heroine.
That is the beauty of books. The words poured out on each page bring information, entertainment, and prick the curiosity to dig deeper into the words on the next page. Regardless of our interests or pursuits there is something tangibly fulfilling about holding a bound book, flipping through each page as the left side becomes thicker than the right side and sooner than once thought getting to that last page with a sigh and a bit of sadness that the story has ended.
The other day I was scrolling through social media and came across a motivational speaker I once heard. He reminded me of a childhood memory long forgotten in our current day of technology. His story took me back in time. Remember the days of walking into the crisp clean classroom at the beginning of school. The floors were freshly polished and the windows sparkly clear. The teacher had hung up the new curtains and organized her desk.
She would then pass out your textbooks. These were usually old and worn on the ends. Each eager student flipped open the hard cover to see who had used their book the year before. This was a big deal and a sure way to strike up a conversation in the playground. We would then flip through the book in awe of how much material was going to be covered, creating a hint of excitement and intimidation.
Our moms would have asked for extra paper bags at the grocery store because we were going to bring those books home in the evening and begin the masterful art of cutting and folding and taping so our books were covered for protection to help preserve them for the students the coming year. Of course, these covers would be falling apart by midyear and by then the excitement would have long since worn off, but somehow this would help the books last.
I recently stumbled upon an old children's history book published in 1932 when I was rummaging around in an antique store in St. Francisville. And inside the hard cover were the names of eleven proud 5th graders who signed their names in cursive and posted their school year. The book was titled Our Nation Begins and to my surprise it read much like a story book with exclamation marks and dialogue among the men and women who helped found the New World. "The fame of Kentucky spread, and after the war with England, men, women, and barefoot children with horses, dogs, and cows, thronged the roads to the beautiful country people called Kaintuc."
You just can't get this stuff on a chromebook. But maybe I am biased. My generation shared in the joy of passing down those tomes where Nancy Drew still leads her young readers into one adventure after another, and textbooks literally had their own scent we equated to getting smart.
