Books in the Library

When you live in a house filled with five  generations of great books, it makes no sense at all to run out of reading material.  Except… how did people 100+ years ago manage that teeny-tiny print?  There are shelves and shelves of books from the 1880s clear through the 1930s that I always thought I’d settle down and read “when I retired.”

Surprise!  My old eyes simply cannot handle the miniscule fonts.  Magnifying glasses?  Yes, this house is full of them — at least five fine large ones from my grandfather’s time — but they are awkward to use and don’t make for a joyful reading experience.  And besides, I can get any of these books in more modern editions through our wonderful Timberland Library System should I be so inclined.

Books in the East Room

No.  I just like the idea of knowing I can grab a book off a shelf on a whim and sit by the fire and… well, you know.  So, after lunch today I did just that, being careful to choose a book that had belonged to my Aunt Mona in the 1950s.  Print size, no problem.  That I’d read it before, probably in 1955, the year it was published, also no problem.  I remembered only that I liked it then and the first few pages have reminded me why.  Although it is about island living here in the northwest, when I was growing up here on the Peninsula in the 1940s, it could have easily been about here — especially during the stormy winter months when the ferry might or might not be running.

Says the author:  I cannot say that everyone should live as we do, but you might be happy on an island if you can face up to the following;

     1.  Dinner guests are often still with you seven days, weeks, months later and sleeping in the lawn swing is fun (I keep telling Don) if you take two sleeping pills and remember that the raccoons are just trying to be friends.

     2.  Any definite appointment, such as childbirth or jury duty, acts as an automatic signal for the ferryboats to stop running.

     3. Finding island property is easy, especially up here in the Northwest where most of the time even the people are completely surrounded by water.  Financing is something else again.  Bankers are urban and everything not visible from a bank is “too far out.”

    4. A telephone call from a relative beginning “Hello, dear, we’ve been thinking of you…” means you are going to get somebody’s children.

Books in the East Room

     5.  Any dinner can be stretched by the addition of noodles to something.

     6.  If you miss the last ferry  — the 1:05 A.M. — you have to sit on the dock all night, but the time will come when you will be grateful for that large body of water between you and those thirteen parking tickets.

     7.  Anyone contemplating island dwelling must be physically strong and it is an added advantage if you aren’t too bright.

Perhaps, by now, you recognize Onions in the Stew — written by Betty MacDonald of The Egg and I fame.  I’m not sure it was what I had in mind when I thought I’d read “the classics” in my retirement years.  But it is, indeed, a classic and I am enjoying it thoroughly!