Welcome to Tuesday!  Today's poem has me thinking about all the ways my life has been enriched by books.  What a joy it is to share favorite books with a friend or family member...some characters become so real that it feels they are part of your family.  I have been so blessed to have a mother, aunts, siblings, children, and friends that are avid readers.  I share of love of Sherlock Holmes (Arthur Conan Doyle) and Mitch Rapp (Vince Flynn) with one son, and right now another son and I are aching over the cruel and harsh lives of characters in the Game of Thrones series (George R.R. Martin).  Meanwhile, my daughter and I are time traveling through Jacobite Scotland with feisty Claire and the love of her life, Jamie, in the Outlander series (Diana Gabaldon).  I will always remember the summer my entire family was reading the final Harry Potter book and spent our evenings discussing the plot twists and turns and agonizing over the fate of our favorite characters.  This weekend my friend and I greeted each other with 'what are you reading?" and exchanged rather lengthy reading lists.  At work yesterday my colleagues recommended two new books--Quiet and The Art of Fielding.

And my mother and I....well, what can I say?  From Anne with an 'e' (Anne of Green Gables) and lonely  Elnora (Girl of the Limberlost) to the adventures of Meg, Jo, Amy and Beth, we've laughed and cried and lived with these characters so long that they are truly part of our lives.  Mother and I have roamed the mist shrouded streets of London with Anne Perry's detectives, cheered on spunky jockeys in Dick Francis novels and traveled the world with our favorite intrepid spy, Mrs. Pollifax.  My mother inspired my love of reading and for that, I am so very grateful. 

There is no frigate like a book
To take us lands away,
Nor any coursers like a page
Of prancing poetry.
This traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of toll;
How frugal is the chariot
That bears a human soul!

--Emily Dickinson




Mother and I at Orchard House, home of the Alcotts in Concord, MA, 2011