Pleasures of the page

My granddaughter Mia called the other night. She wanted to tell me about the book I had just given her, “Wonder,” by R. J. Palacio. What she said was, “The first sentence was amazing.” She couldn’t put it down, was up past her bedtime reading.

When I gave her the first book in the “Little House” series, she had to be coaxed into it. “Read the first chapter,” I urged her, “I think you‘ll like it.” She gobbled up the whole series. Mia has the gift of being taken up by books. Her brother and cousins, too. If I ask what they are reading, they never fail to have an enthusiastic answer. 

My sister-in-law Susan told me about a book by a friend of hers, Will Schwalbe’s “The End of Your Life Book Club.”  I haven’t read it yet, but it’s one of the next on my list. The book club of the title has just two members, mother and son, who spend the mother’s final months talking about books and life.  What could be better than ending your days in conversation about books with someone you love?

And today as the wind is knocking tree limbs against the windows and we have warnings of storm-caused power outages, I am thinking about the good fortune of being in the world with books. In fact, I am planning to finish this post and then, whether or not the lights are still on, I am going to give myself a day without power except for the power of words on the page.