...a special bond between people who like the same books." This thought goes a long way in explaining why I feel an affinity for people I have never met but know I like because we share a love for the written word. Once again, I have trusted another blogger's affection for an author and have been rewarded tenfold. For the longest time, I have been bumping into Gladys Taber at Nan's Letters from a Hill Farm but not until Nan met Susan (if you scroll down on Branch's page, there is a beautiful tribute to Taber) during a fortuitous hour of blog-catching-up, did I finally seek Gladys out. I was lucky to find that my library had six of her books (and several others that I can attain through inter-library loans).
I am always a little nervous when I pick up a new-to-me author that a blogger who I respect loves for fear that I may not feel the same but Taber's Stillmeadow Calendar was finished within twenty-four hours and there was no need to worry. It was exactly the book I needed to settle my mind and my heart as we set up in our new home. So many things needed to get done that I couldn't truly relax. And I needed to relax after moving and cleaning for six straight days but with my mind racing with all that would need to be done within the next couple of months I just couldn't. The one thing that usually can slow me down, a good book, just wasn't working. Nothing I picked up had the desired effect. Until I tested the Taber waters by reading the foreword to Stillmeadow Calendar in which Gladys writes about the Connecticut farmhouse she and her friend, Jill, make, first, into their second home, and, second, into their first home. It was an ongoing process as the making of any home is. This, I needed to be reminded of.
As for the rest of the book, it is simply wonderful, full of so many passages I wanted to highlight or underline but alas could not since it belongs to the library:) There is an undercurrent of sadness as the year Gladys writes about is one spent without her beloved Jill but the presence of family and friends tempers the great loss.
I have moved onto Stillmeadow Daybook and am savoring bits of it in between organizing the garage (isn't the point to park the cars inside, not park boxes one doesn't wish to unpack) and filling up the wading pool to combat the heat and humidity. How I wish we had the Stillmeadow pond to paddle around in instead. I would wear my old suit and tennis shoes just like Gladys but would also throw on the great sun hat her friend dons for a swim. Oh well...I will just be grateful for the yard we have which is a perfect patch for reading a good book.
