Wednesday, October 1, 2008

score

so its about 230 and i was so tired of working (plus i knew i had a late night ahead of me assembling invitations (for work), which i rather enjoy, so i'm not complaining. more establishing that i am not a slacker; i just get a bulk of my work done at unconventional hours. but i digress...) 230, tired of working...right... dutch had played with and pushed around every possible object in the house that did not give a substantial amount of resistance, and "ooh'd" with his face and hands pressed up against the patio window at jack outside until he had no 'ooh's' left, and was at that point of boredom where he just grabs my pants under the table and gives me the whiney 'moooom, pay attention to me' face. which is usually my signal to pack him up and head to whole foods for a change of scene. i was whole fooded out and decided we would head to half price books for a looksee at the kids section. fast forward 15 min and on our way back to the kids section, i pass a nondiscript little book cart pushed to the side. as i squeeze by it, i notice something VERY familiar.

three. vintage. nancy drew. books. gasp!!!

flashback to my youth living in the middle of nowhere, alaska. once or twice a week my mom would take us kids to the itty bitty middle of nowhere public library and we were allowed to roam free and choose as many books as the library would allow us to check out at a time. we didn't have cable, nor did we have any malls or a hurricane harbor/six flags to frequent, and as a result i grew to love reading. passionately. i only recently told my mom that i used to stay up and read under my covers until the wee hours of the morning. if my flashlight gave out (which happened quite often), back up plan was to move to the hallway and sit by the nightlight (one of those motion sensor types where you have to stand right in front of the sensor before it turned on) and just pray mom and dad were in bed for good and not given to making a quick round of 'check on the kids.' sometimes if i didn't feel like scrunching down on the floor and holding my free hand in front of said nightlight , i would go sit in the bathroom and read, hoping that my occassional and carefully timed flushes would lead my mom to think i was just in there 'doing business' and heading dutifully back to bed. apparently it worked.

my first and favourite section at the library included an entire collection of nancy drew mysteries. not the cheapo paperbacks you see today with the uber cheesy cartoon characters. these were vintage hardback nancy drew's. the ones with the yellowing pages, the simple black pen drawings, and that old book smell. i read them over and over and over, keeping a very careful rotation of titles so that i wouldn't find myself reading the same one i'd read just last week. i have a gift (or disability) of being able to forget most of the details of a story very shortly after its been read, which means i am able to read and re-read the same book over and over again and still get the same rush that i got the first time i read it. sure i remember some things, like the basic plot and the characters, etc. but that's about it. zach teases me about my affinity for reading the same books in our bookshelf over and over. it's like watching a favourite movie; you just never get tired of it and actually look forward to your favourite bits.

back to half price books... i've spied these same exact books i grew to love as a child; same hardback cover, same yellowing pages and pen drawings, same old book smell. it was a moment of glory! i snatched them up and after completing my mission of finding dutch some books of his own with 'real' pictures and not drawings (supposed to help them learn better) we headed to pay for our new (used) treasures.

my treasures now sit on our bookshelf, proudly displayed in the living room and i simply cannot wait until bedtime when i get to open one and read it. thanks half price books, you rock!!

4 comments:

Des said...

Oh I LOVED Nancy Drew Books also. I know the exact ones you are talking about.
That took me down memory lane as well.
I love reading!

becki said...

Liz I think that you and I grew up as the same person. Seriously. I used to sit under my heavy comforter with my bedside lamp under the covers with me and read for hours on school nights. Or with a flashlight. Always with the "on/off" button clicked juuuuust to the point of being able to flick off as soon as I heard my bedroom door open so I wasn't caught, which I still was a lot. And I cannot tell you my love of Nancy Drew hardback books. I had the SAME ones. The kind of bluish cover and the yellowing pages. I own ALL of them (weren't there like 25-30?) and they are somewhere and this makes me want to find them and display them proudly!

Also I recently bought a journal at half price books who's cover was a nancy drew book cover. Love it!

bullets said...

this is just as long of a blog as mine on politics was

Lolly said...

Yet inspiring! I started reading a book I have had for years and never picked up immediately after I read this blog.