READING & THINKING

I am reading a book by Laurie Graham titled The Future Homemakers Of America. It's about 6 but mainly 4 wives of Air Force pilots back in the 1950's. It's really good. I haven't read a book that wasn't the bible or a devotional or related to the 12 steps in months and months now. I have begun several things: The Edible Woman by Margaret Atwood, one of my favorite authors; A Very Proper Death by Alex Juniper; The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis and one other can't think of the name of right off. Every one of them lost me shortly after I started. I just think I wasn't ready yet. Then I picked up this one by Laurie Graham. Slid it right off my book shelf in the hallway and have had my nose in it every night when I come upstairs since then.

So much has changed since the '50's... I remember the last house we lived in when my dad was still in the Air Force. It was awesome. It had a large living room, large dining room, 4 big bedrooms and 2 baths. The kitchen wasn't huge but it was so nice during the few years we lived there.

Back then, neighbors were neighborly, and it was reasonably safe to walk after dark although children weren't allowed to do that - except for one night a year and that was Halloween night. On Halloween night we left our houses just after sundown and we didn't come home sometimes until midnight. And we didn't have to have parents with us either. We walked all around the base from the smaller houses to some of the larger ones where "higher ups" lived. People did their best to scare us when we knocked on their doors and it was scary tingling delightful. I can remember walking up to a door with my friends and brother and shivering even though in El Paso, Texas, it was generally warm. The shivering was from wondering what we would be seeing. People answered their doors as boogey men or witches or goblins and ghosts but we knew deep down that there was no real reason to be afraid. All those people were our friends, sort of like family. And on the way home, it went slower than when we had started out because our bags were full of candy and apples and popcorn balls and UNICEF cartons, and we didn't have to worry either about looking for razor blades or glass or poison because back then, people just didn't think that way. Now, of course, there are a lot of people going to hell in a hand basket and they think nothing of doing nasty things to children in more ways than one.

While dad was in the Air Force, we lived in California, Ohio, Texas and Kentucky with Grandma while he went to Germany. I'll have to tell you about my grandma sometime.... she was old and poor as dirt, but fed us well and was the best grandma ever.....

Well, for now, back to reading....