The More Things Change, the More I Still Wish I Had a Book and a Bath

Oh, it couldn't be later, and I got back hours later than I expected to from my children's literature book group, which is a good thing, in that it was so enjoyable, but a bad thing in that earlier--knowing I would regret it--I made Eggplant Parmesan and Caesar salad for dinner instead of writing my 750 words.

So I will give you oh, say, 250 words instead, loosely on the subject of a book called Betsy's Little Star by a really old-fashioned unremarkable writer named Carolyn Haywood, whose name came up tonight when it turned out I was not the only person I knew who had actually read her. This book, and the others in a series about a girl named Betsy and her little sister, Star, were among the very first chapter books I ever read. Not because they are so wonderful, or because someone I knew felt passionately about them, but because they somehow seemed accessible to me in the Sudbury Public Library, I chose them by myself, and I could read them by myself. And so I did.

And these were among the first books I was able to lose myself in, because they were longer than picture books, and there was more than one of them. The characters were the same, with variations, of course, but I could get to know Betsy, feel I understood her, anticipate what she was going to do in any given situation. I ordered the first Betsy book for Lily not so long ago from Amazon, thinking it would be quite nice if it were to be among her first solo chapter books as well, but the paperback arrived looking all glossy and modernized. It was not the soft, worn, pale blue hardbound book of my memory, and I haven't actually given it to her yet.

But Betsy's Little Star I remember in particular, as relates to the notion of losing oneself in a book, because I read it in the bathtub. And I remember I read it in the bathtub because I dropped it in the bathtub, and although we dried it in front of the radiator, it dried all wrinkly and warped, and I had to bring it into the librarian, whose name was also Betsy, and explain what I had done.

And if it were even two hours earlier, there is still nothing I would like more in this world than to be in the bathtub reading a book.