So now what, as another self-regarding, soon-to-be-octogenarian moves into the White House? We can only hope that the executioner’s axe doesn’t fall on our fair city, that our nation survives and maybe even thrives, and that rookie Congressman Jeff Crank can persuade President Trump to keep all existing military bases here in reliably Republican Colorado Springs. Actually, let’s have Lauren Boebert be Colorado’s spokesperson – she’s as tough and ruthless as Trump, and knows how to stay in his good graces.
And if all else fails, maybe we can ask Denmark to trade Greenland for Colorado. We’d be a peaceful island of rationality in a sea of lunacy. But we might have to close the borders to desperate Democratic migrants from Trumpland …
That’s enough of politics; let’s talk about happier things, like books and libraries.
In “Little Women,” Louisa May Alcott describes Uncle March’s library, as experienced by Jo March: “The dim, dusty room, with the busts staring down from the tall bookcases, the cozy chairs, the globes, and, best of all, the wilderness of books, in which she could wander where she liked, made the library a region of bliss to her.”
Our 1899 Westside Queen Anne looks like a house with a library, and it might have had one in the early 1900s, but it didn’t survive the house’s transition from single-family grandeur to third-rate boarding house. It was thoroughly renovated in the 1970s, once again as a single-family dwelling, and we updated it when we bought it 25 years ago. We don’t have any built-in bookshelves – just eight bookcases scattered around the house, as well as three in the garage. That means I can’t find any particular book, and, cursed with an octogenarian’s memory, I don’t remember what I have. And how many do we have? Around five thousand.
They bring delight. A few days ago, I came across a tattered paperback copy of “Little Women,” apparently purchased by my daughter at Poor Richard’s in the 1990s for $1. I guiltily realized that I’d never read Alcott’s masterpiece, so I dedicated the next three days to reading it.
It was transformative. Had I read it at 17, I think it would have changed me for the better and made me less of a self-involved, womanizing jerk. Oh, well – at 84, it may be too late to change, but it’ll never be too late to read a good book.
So, what’s next? Looking through the bookcases, I found “The Mosquito Coast” by Paul Theroux and “The Feast of the Goat” by Mario Vargas Llosa. I dunno – I’m not quite ready to give up my infatuation with 19th-century women authors. I’ve read Jane Austen’s “Sense and Sensibility” as well as “Pride and Prejudice,” so maybe I have a copy of “Emma” somewhere. As for contemporary writing, I have already found the perfect book for our era of short attention spans: Nora Ephron’s “I Remember Nothing.”
If not, I’m off to Hooked on Books tomorrow, to see what’s available.
