Some time ago I was asked about my favorite pastime as a child. That was a long time ago, but I didn't have to do a lot of thinking before answering. My favorite way to spend an afternoon was leaning against a tree trunk, curled up in chair, or stretched out on a blanket on the backyard lawn with a book! I read Albert Payson Terhune's books about Sunnybrook Farm and the collies that lived there with the Mistress and the Master. It was all so real to me that I could hear the breeze ruffling the leaves of the trees at the edge of the great lawn out in front of the house, and smell the sweet scent of blooming roses wafting up from the gardens in the cool of a summer evening. I could smell the warm coats of Lad and Bruce as they lay at the Master's feet in the sun and feel their cold noses as they accepted an absent-minded stroke from the Mistress as she sat reading in her lawn chair.
I read the Black Stallion series by Walter Farley and imagined horses to be the most noble creatures on earth (next to collie dogs, of course). I'd doodle horse heads on any scrap of paper laying near to hand, and daydreamed about the home I would live in one day, when I was old and married. There would be a kennel and a stable, exercise yards for the dogs, and large corrals over sloping meadows where the horses would graze, and run, and spend their days. There would be woods near the house where I could ride for hours in the dappled shade on smooth paths that wound through the undergrowth. I would walk the dogs there too, in packs of 5 or 6, meandering through the trees as they explored every scent and trail.
I read every Zane Grey novel of the old west that my Grandfather owned (and there were a lot!). I yearned for a time when visiting a neighbor meant a day's ride, a time when character was more important that wealth or education or peer groups. I loved the descriptions of the prairies and the desert and the mountain passes. Those descriptions were so vivid, that when I grew up, and began to spend time in the deserts of Southern California, I felt as if I had come home. It's still a place I love. The heat, the clear mornings and big starry night sky, the flora and the fauna are all a welcome retreat for me when we can get away for a few days. I'm especially fond of early spring when the wildflowers first bloom.
I read the Box Car Kids, Nancy Drew, and dozens of others; but my favorites were books about animals. White Fang and Call of the Wild, Black Beauty, and so many others! We moved around a lot when I was growing up, and I've never made friends quickly or easily, so books became my friends! I learned the Dewey Decimal system and the workings of the public libary early on and was never without someone to play with, something to do, or somewhere to go. I don't think many days of my life have gone by without the presence of an open book, a stack of books I want to read, and a stack of books waiting to be returned to the library, loaned to friends or given away. I no longer carry one with me, having learned the value of reaching out to the people around me, and the isolating barriers we can build when we stop reaching out to those we come into contact with, but there is always a book on my night stand, waiting for a few moments of pleasure at the end of the day.
