Well, hello and welcome!
Let this be the first of many get togethers! When I was making a list of my favourite books on my home page I was reminded of just how much re-reading I do. Oh, and that list of favourite books…not even nearly complete! I find the familiar comforting, that sense of being at home. When travelling I enjoy return visits, really like staying long enough in one spot so that I get to know my way about. Like self-catering, so I could go grocery shopping and experience that odd intimacy of chatting in a queue or by a fruit stand. And so I love those books that have become good friends, old friends, trusted friends. Some of my favourite books are simply a good place to go to breathe out, somewhere to take a rest from the world. Others are that but more importantly than that, they can be a visit to people who do the right thing, who remind me that what I think and do carries weight. What a pleasure to find an author who entertains one while doing all that! For me Olivia Douglas and Elizabeth Goudge are the open sesame to that happy place. But the D.E. Stevenson books are something else again. Books that manage a happy outcome however rocky the road may be.
But reading is not all there is by a long shot! Life is full of joy and pleasure. I wanted to say even in the time of covid, but it is ESPECIALLY in the time of covid! Watching movies, cooking something nice to eat, being out and about in the great outdoors and talking to the people I love. Oh I get downhearted, I get scared and sad but I am learning to remind myself of what is good and beautiful sooner rather than later. And you know what? Those books of mine help me do that!
Earlier today I saw that someone had described a book as being about life as it is lived. And that is what I would like to write about, life, in the larger sense, and MY life as it is lived.