To be a reader

I am reader.  I have always been a reader and I will always be a reader.  I will always have full bookshelves, a Kindle in my desk drawer and a wish list of books a mile long.  

I remember the summer it all began, I don't remember the year but I remember it was summer and my sister Cindy had a good friend of her family who was a teacher. Cindy took me to her house to borrow some books.  It was then I met Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House in the Big Woods and I was a goner. I couldn't read that series enough. I read every book over and over and over again. I probably had them memorized. I went home the end of that summer to have my mom get me the whole set for my very own. I read them so many times I wore them out. The spines were cracked, pages were dog eared, and some even falling out.  I loved those books. 

Some Sunday mornings my mom and I would stop at the local bookstore and I'd be allowed to pick out 2 or 3 or 5 books for my very own. I read everything by Judy Blume and a few Beverley Cleary to V.C. Andrews and Danielle Steele and now Karen White, Patti Callahan Henry, Elin Hilderbrand, Robyn Carr, and so many more.  

We had a subscription to Reader's Digest once, I loved the day the new issue came in the mail. I'd read that little magazine from cover to cover, All in a Days Work, Humor In Uniform, the featured stories, every last bit.  My mom also subscribed to Guideposts which was another fave.  His Mysterious Ways was the best feature! Even a Parents magazine or Grandma Nollf's National Enquirer rag would do!  It seemed there were never enough words to be read. 

Somewhere around high school my appetite for books took a lull and I didn't read much until my early 20's.   Now I read about slavery, Civil Rights, the Holocaust, World War II, Vietnam, Ellis Island, Henry Ford, women's rights, The White House, John F. Kennedy and his assassination, things I never thought I'd have an interest in. But, I do.

I asked my husband once how he would describe me.  His answer was "well read".  I like being a reader.  I like knowing a little about a lot of topics.  I like getting lost in a book for an hour or 3.  Books kept me out of trouble, kept my mind sharp, kept some of the demons at bay.  I'm thankful I grew to be reader.  I hate to think what I would have been without. 

Thank you Betty James for introducing me to Laura Ingalls Wilder, encouraging me to read, read more and read often.  To you, I will always be grateful. 

Marriage (again)

This topic is probably the biggest, broadest most frustrating topic in all the land, well, this and parenthood.

It's an odd tradition to think about. Marriage. Take a minute - boy meets girl and there is this spark.  That's all.  It doesn't matter where they're from, what their backgrounds are, their opinions are or who their family is, there is just this undeniable magnetism, this force that pulls you together no matter the circumstances - some move across the country, across oceans to follow this spark.  Some leave their whole families behind - be it in disagreement or distance.  Some leave jobs, homes, sadly some even leave their children.  It's really something how all these changes arise from one spark.You just know you'll work all these things out...somehow.

And you do...or you think you do.  

I have been with my husband for approximately 14 years.  14 years of working things out.  Sometimes the work is really simple.  We disagree, see each other's points, apologize if needed and we move on to the next disagreement.  But, some times, there are these fights where you scream, holler and yell at each other like a 6th grader on the playground duking it out over who's on first, knowing   neither of you will ever win, completely disregarding any sort of respect for each other, totally going for the throat and there is no teacher here to save your stupid ass.  This has more than once  involved one of us packing bags, threatening "I've had enough of you" and many other horrible things and yet somehow we talk our way off this precipice and manage to mop up the mess and move on.

Some think marriage is about control, funny those who think I can control what my husband says or does. (Or God forbid he can control me) I pray to tell you, he is a man of his own mind who acts or reacts of his own accord.  And if you must know, I honestly believe he is the most stubborn, hard headed of us both. Marriage isn't all him, and it isn't all me.  I think for myself, he thinks for himself, at times we have to think for each other and all the time, we have to do what we think best on the fly.  There are many times I wonder why he reacts his way and I know he can't figure out my reactions to save his soul but, I think true key here is to call them as you see them and do what you see fit.  

We don't pretend anything between us, or around us, we are very down to Earth, realistic people.  No smoke.  No mirrors.  He sees my worst and I see his.  I can't say I'm proud of those moments but, he knows me, what I am, who I am and he loves me anyway.   I'm very blessed. 

Every marriage is different and only one of them belongs to you.  We (or I) try to remember our marriage is simply ours.  It's our success or our failure. No one else knows what goes on between us behind closed doors.  No one knows the things we see or we talk about, things we do or don't do. It's easy to judge someone else's relationship (even easier when you're a parent) but the hardest thing to remember is these things oftentimes have to play out for the lessons to be learned.