Word Association

My son got me an annotated copy of The Wind In The Willows for Father's Day. This is one of my favorite books. I insisted that my wife read it when we first met, and I read it to both of my children. My father gave it to me as a Christmas present. I know that he liked the book a great deal, and that he insisted that my mother read it when they first met. In my mother's bookcases is an older copy of the book, that I imagine was my father's. My grandfather was born in 1905, three years before the book was published. I believe that it must have been one of his favorite books growing up, and he must have insisted that my grandmother read it when they first met. Certainly, he must have introduced it to my father.

I don't believe everyone is enthusiastic for The Wind In The Willows, but there are too many emotions tied into the book for me to consider it very critically. I have similar feelings for The Chronicles Of Narnia and Where The Red Fern Grows. My Aunt Electa sent me a boxed edition of The Chronicles Of Narnia for Christmas when I was probably in third or fourth grade. My Aunt Joyce gave me Where The Red Fern Grows about the same Christmas. I remember a wild combination of gifts from favorite aunts, Christmas, and stories that were beyond anything that I could imagine. I made my wife and children read these books as well, but they only got the story part of the mix.

When I was in fifth or sixth grade, my family drove from Kansas City, Missouri, to the East Coast where all of my father's relatives lived. Boston and the rest of New England were unimaginably exotic and sophisticated to me. We stayed for a few days with my Aunt Jo and her family in their home in the Berkshires. I slept in a spare room, most likely a library or overflow from a libray. When Aunt Jo showed me my room, she said I should feel free to read anything there. My Uncle Tom pointed out A Clockwork Orange and tried to explain the importance of the corrupt language used by the characters. I certainly didn't understand the book that first time, but the opportunity to read it in such a setting and to have it explained to me by Aunt Jo and Uncle Tom keep me returning to try and understand it.

When I met my wife, (she wasn't actually my wife at the time,) she had a few books that she insisted I read as well. The Princess Bride has been the one that I return to most often. It is a fundamentally silly story, but it hasn't grown stale. I can read it and recall the feeling of being very young and desperately in love with the woman who wasn't my wife yet. The children had to read this story as well, this time at the insistence of both parents.

There are books still waiting to be bound to me by friends and relatives not yet born, just as there are people unaware they will some day be forced to read The Wind In The Willows. For now, I will enjoy the books that were given to me on this Father's Day.