Booming Banter

Last week nephew Krishna suggested that at some point Anne of Green Gables might feature in the Book Love Banter.

After Heidi, David Copperfield and Little Women it was one of the first novels I read and probably the first that I made an effort to go out and buy myself.

The tale of an orphan girl coming to live with an elderly brother and sister is both funny and heart warming.

The reason it is written on my heart though is not because of the book itself which is great but because of a wonderful BBC adaptation of the story and it’s sequels that ran from 1972-1974.

It ran on Sunday evenings and I can remember so well my bestie Carol and I watching it on our TV. We had a color one that many people didn’t at the time so we could see Anne’s beautiful red hair. Anne was played by Kim Braden and we loved her because she was both naughty and nice.

Carol was especially fond of her because she had more freckles than Carol! We were both in love with Gilbert Blythe 

So why did Anne of Green Gables get its well deserved mention today?

Well as Krishna husband and I were turning off the main road onto our street this afternoon I looked left a little earlier than usual. Through the leafless trees set high up on the bluff I saw something I never noticed in the ten years we’ve lived here.

Believe it or not it was an old cream colored farm house with what else but GREEN GABLES! Seek and ye shall find!

Blessing # 585 – Hidden Gems

Lunch today was an outing with girlfriends to a new Tex Mex restaurant called Chuys. It’s a chain started in Austin Texas in the 1980s but it has now expanded to more than 100 locations.

The decor is fun and the food is reasonably priced and good. The salsa was fresh and loaded with chilies perfect for me but not for the others so I ate the whole bowl. Might regret that tomorrow.

We have quite a collection of cook books and among them of course there are some on Mexican food. As we’re very partial to spicy stuff and with all the beans used too it’s a good place to look for dishes for our vegetarian friends and family.

I’m ashamed to say though that in spite of love for the food I haven’t read a single Mexican novel and only one set in Texas and that was The Ewing’s of Dallas!!!!!!

So now I feel spurred on to get started on Mexican literature and have hit on a book that sounds just up my street. Like Water for Chocolate como agua para chocolate.

Any other suggestions welcome

Blessing # 584 – Summer Menu

Today as we honor the great Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr we should maybe nibble on a little cheddar or gruyere as it’s also National Cheese Lovers Day.

We got a lovely lie in as Aaron is off school and there was a little snow overnight so everything was so bright when we surfaced.

The snow wasn’t deep but it was the sort that sparkles probably because it’s so cold the crystals remain intact.

Cheese and snow what else could come to mind but Switzerland and of course the sweet story of Heidi.

I’m pretty sure my Dad bought the book for me when I was still in primary school and I read it several times but that was so long ago. The innocence of the child and the love of the grandfather was definitely written on my heart. Would be well worth another read one of these days.

Thoughts of the lovely kind little girl playing around the alps made me feel so nostalgic for Switzerland. It’s definitely one of the most beautiful places in the world and the cheese isn’t bad either! Yet in all the years we lived there never once did we visit the area where Heidi is set. So there’s a plan that needs making with my Swiss pal Patricia!

Blessing # 583 – Girls of the Grison

Overnight the temperature plummeted and the wind picked up to a point that it turned us around when we weren’t a quarter mile from home.

Poor Scooby is desperate to get out and have some fun. He’s gazing beseechingly into my eyes but walks today will be 100 yard sprints.

All we can do is play ball and catch up on some good TV.

PBS has just started to run Sanditon a novel Jane Austen started but didn’t complete. I’d never heard of it but so far so good as stories go.

The bitter cold that’s so bad it hurts is something that you can imagine might have happened in one of the great Russian epics like Dr Shivargo or War and Peace but I haven’t read any of them so they are not written on my heart.

Instead it rekindled my love for my number one book The Good Earth. Can you imagine what it must be like to not just be freezing but starving too? How the people of China suffered during the great famines.

The courage of women like O-LAN makes you realize how very hard life must have been not so very long ago. Born a slave, sold to farmer Wang Lung to be his bride she lived it all with very few words.

Happiness and success were swiftly followed by great loss and rejection O-LAN bore it so well and will forever be a hero in my heart for her faithfulness and true love.

Blessing # 582 – Trusting Souls

Today I abandoned my Zumba pals for a good cause. Freezing rain. It is absolutely the worst thing about Ohio winters. Horrific to drive in as the rain turns to ice on contact with any surface; roads, trees, cars you name it.

As Scooby had to wait for his walk until the road thawed we got to grooming and I removed a small rabbit from his back before he escaped me.

Once the thaw came the rain became a torrent but we had to motor on. It was the first of our core team meetings for our next Kairos Weekend at the Ohio Reformatory for Women.

We met for lunch as ladies do before getting down to business. All of us are such different characters you could write a book about us.

Maybe we’d be like the Little Women currently hitting the silver screen. Or would it be the ladies of Lark Rise to Candleford?

If I had to choose though we’d be the Cranford crew.

The funny, loving and somewhat eccentric Gaskell gals.

Blessing # 581 – Sisters

Each morning when we get up Scooby and I have taken to having a little cuddle before we head out. It gets the day off to such a good start. Only takes a minute but leaves us both smiling.

As we’re looking for book characters written on our hearts the question was obvious “which dog would that be?”

There aren’t that many to choose from when you think about it. In the classics there is Bill Sike’s Bulls Eye in Oliver Twist, Mr Rochester’s Pilot in Jane Eyre and all those poor creatures in Wuthering Heights.

In more recent times we also have Marly and Me and Lady and the Tramp in which our Scooby could easily Star! Maybe you have others if so do tell.

My favorite by far though and the one that immediately sprung to mind is Tricki Woo the beloved Pekingese of Mrs Pumphrey in All Creatures Great and Small.

Just as I am besotted with Scooby so Mrs Pumphrey was with her dear Tricki. I’d hazard a guess they had a sneaky little snuggle too each morning. He certainly was a very pampered pooch.

James Herriott wrote many tales of wonderful dogs and one little book that is treasured in our home is a compilation of many of these stories. It lives in our guest bedroom to be enjoyed by visitors missing their own little wet nose.

Wonder does the Queen cuddle her dorgis’ Vulcan and Candy. She certainly needs all the love she can get right now. So my recommendation is go for it your Maj and come visit anytime.

Blessing # 580 – Morning Kiss

This morning our nephew’s wife posted a beautiful new photo of their little girl as they are celebrating Pongal the Indian harvest festival.

Just to explain a little how mind works this picture got me thinking of cute little girls in literature and the first one that came to mind was Eppie from Silas Marner.

Eppie whose real name was Hephzibah transformed the life of poor old Silas.

Silas had had a rough time and one that might have made others bitter but all he did was withdraw.

He’d been falsely accused of robbery, forced to move from his home and then later, after much hard work as a weaver, had been robbed himself of everything he’d saved.

While all this was taking place Eppie’s Mum an abandoned opium addict was trying to find her estranged husband and alas died in the process leaving poor little Eppie only two years old lost and alone on a winters night.

Eppie finds Silas and in a sense they rescue each other. He has no knowledge of little children but soon grows so attached to Eppie and she to him that they cannot live without each other.

There’s a lot more intrigue but in the end Eppie sticks with Silas and they all live happily ever after.

This is the only novel by George Elliot that I’ve ever read. That too was a very long time ago probably 1975 but just see how a good book can stick. Silas and his willingness to forgive and to love stuck with me. Even today, forty five years on seeing one sweet girl brought back memories of another.

This but of mental exercise has also given me a nudge in the right direction for this summers reading. The classic will have to be Middlemarch. Maybe I should start at spring break!

Blessing # 579 – Little Loves

This morning the school district called us at 5:15 to announce that school was running on a two hour delay due to “inclement” weather. What this might be we decided would be a surprise as we turned off the alarm and went back to sleep!

Turned out it was fog of Dickensian proportions. Scooby was totally perplexed as we couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of us. Very spooky but a good prod on the book for today.

I haven’t read all of Dickens novels but by far the favorite among those I know is David Copperfield. Seems it was also Dickens “favorite  child”.

David himself is someone I could take or leave. He’s a bit flaky. The supporting characters though are adorable. Barkis and Peggotty and the Micawbers are wonderful and when it comes to admirable women who could ever forget Betsy Trotwood.

Her honesty in making her desire for a niece rather than a nephew so clear on the night of David’s birth, her willingness to speak up and stand up to David’s horrible stepfather and of course her tenderness and kindness not just to David but also to the adorable Mr Dick.

Certainly Dickens must have encountered someone equally gracious in his lifetime in order to develop such a beautiful person.

He also must have had some run ins with hateful people like the obnoxious Uriah Heep. The things that Dickens engraved on my heart with this creep were the virtues of the Betsys in this world and to be beware of false modesty and finally that wonderful word we hardly ever used obsequious!

Blessing # 578 – Sincerity

Bit late on the banter as it was dealers night at the mall. We go in after hours to update our booths, reorganize and dust our treasures.

This has been a great experience for me. Getting to know a new set of people. Everyone is helpful and encouraging and there’s so much to learn about the business.

The mall is in Delaware Ohio the county seat and home of one of the country’s presidents Rutherford Hayes. It was established in 1808 so the city has a lot of character.

Its hard to imagine though that the first house wasn’t even built when Jane Austen wrote Pride and Prejudice. It was no more than a village when the novel was published in 1811!

This is the book I’ve read most often. The first time was as a sixteen year old at school. It was part of our O-Level syllabus and man am I glad it was!

Unlike the complexity of the Forsyte Saga it’s possible to get to grips with every character in Pride and Prejudice. The one that is written forever into my heart is Lizzie Bennett. 

For sure there are many of you who can relate. Lizzie was and is an inspiration. One of the best loved ladies in literature and portrayed by multiple stars of stage and screen!

She had spunk. Somewhat unconventional for her day she was willing to stand up for herself and her sisters.

Was Jane Austen like Lizzie? It’s seems she may well have been. She turned down a proposal, she travelled, she was stubborn and she dared to dream!

Way to go girls!

Blessing # 577 – Hopes of Heroines

These last weeks it has been forbidden to speak to me between seven and eight on Sunday evenings. The Forsyte Saga is running on PBS.

It’s the 2002 version with Damian Lewis as Soames. My Mother was just as addicted to the original 1967 version when it ran on BBC. Everyone was silenced!

The trilogy is just as good as the TV series. Probably very racy for the time when it was published and definitely on my top ten list of best books. If you haven’t read it do give it a go.

Last night Soames and Irene the long divorced key characters meet in a museum with their children by from their subsequent marriages. It’s awful in its awkwardness and the looks of hate and hopelessness are horrible.

Made me ponder what makes a great story and the conclusion reached was that there has to be at least one character that becomes written onto your own heart.

This might be surprising but in the Forsyte Saga for me it’s Soames. He appears cold and mercenary but he is a good son and brother. He is sadly obsessed with his first love Irene but shows that he has redeeming character in his love for his only child Fleur.

Even though I was just a child when the first series ran I never forgot Eric Porter and his sad dark look. Damian Lewis as Soames has quite a different appearance but both of them you could class as creepy. Almost like Dracula. So what’s it that makes the character so pointent. The depth, the sadness the goodness that eventually come to light. Who cares to speculate?

Blessing # 576 – Redemption