review

Review: Everything I Need to Know, I Learned from a Little Golden Book

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Yesterday, my husband showed up home from work and held this book out to me (along with a gorgeous new notepad and gel pen, the man really knows how to get to me). “For you,” he said, “I figured you’d chewed on enough of them in your childhood, so you’d appreciate it. And he’s right. When I was a child, I had dozens of Little Golden Books, both with the golden and the silver spines and I loved them for the mere fact that they were books. But I also liked them for another reason. I thought the spines were delicious. I would sit and chew on the spines of those books and just think. It’s like how some adults chew on pens or pencils in the midst of thought, that’s what I did as a kid. And it remains a joke within my family, especially now that I have a fourteen-month-old daughter who adores chewing on books herself.

However, this book really touched my heart. Full of advice and adages for a “golden” life, it pulls its wisdom from some of its most popular and beloved books, such as The Saggy Baggy Elephant, Baby Listens, Tootles, and The Pokey Little Puppy. As I sat on my couch and read through it, I smiled with every page, not only at the familiar illustrations but also at the simple but very encouraging advice. If you are looking for a keepsake book to just make you smile, this is a wonderful choice! 🙂

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Review & Reflection: I Like a Girl Who Reads

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“So, what do you go for in a girl?”
He crows, lifting a lager to his lips
Gestures where his mate sits
Downs his glass
“He prefers tits
I prefer ass.
What do you go for in a girl?”

I don’t feel comfortable
The air left the room a long time ago
All eyes are on me
Well, if you must know

I want a girl who reads.

This is the beginning of a slam poem by Mark Grist entitled “Girls Who Read”, the video of which on YouTube has garnered over three million views. A friend of mine posted this video on Facebook this morning and I had never heard of it before, much less watched it. As I watched the video and Grist went through how he loves a girl who reads and who “uses the added vocabulary/She gleans from novels and poetry/To hold lively conversation/In a range of social situations”, I felt my heart warm and that familiar burning behind my eyes that tells me I’m going to cry.

I know that girls who read are appreciated but an homage like this is a fabulous reminder that made me feel wonderful. I read compulsively, you know that. I love a story that flows, that challenges, learning new vocabulary, descriptions, and falling in love with the characters I find in novels. In junior high, I was teased pretty mercilessly by the other kids in my small eight-grade classroom. They didn’t understand why I read the books I did or why I read books at all. I did my best to ignore them but the truth was that it hurt, a lot. When I got to college, I found an outlet and use for my voracious reading as an English Education major/Literature minor. In graduate school, I wrote my Master’s thesis over some of my favorite short stories, even. And I found a man who loved me for my imagination, for my love of reading. The first significant amount of time that we spent together was spent discussing Tolkien and poetry over coffee.

So this poem/video meant a great deal to me today. Five stars! Well done, Mark Grist, and thank you!

Music Review: Michael Buble – “To Be Loved”

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I don’t usually do music reviews but this album was just undeniable.

A little background first. I turned 30 years old today. I was woken up by my 4-month-old daughter at 6:30am to eat, half an hour before I HAD to be up to get her underway to getting ready for her 8:30am wellness check appointment. As we were finishing her cross-eyed feeding, my husband (who was himself getting ready for work), came to me, kissed my forehead, wished me a happy birthday, handed me two cards and two parcels, and took the baby, telling her, “Come with Daddy-monster so Mommy can open her cards and presents.” I followed them into the living room and opened up a card “from” Elizabeth (with Daddy’s help) and one from my husband (it was quite perfect; he’s getting good at this card-picking thing). Then I looked at my presents. The first one was this album.

On my way to the doctor’s office with Elizabeth, I listened to the first half of the album and found myself smiling all the way there. It starts out with one of my favorite light-hearted pieces, “You Make Me Feel So Young”, and it sets the tone for the whole album, which, to me, feels like a giant cache of love letters. There are letters of everlasting love, love to one’s self in doing what’s best for your heart (“It’s a Beautiful Day”), letters of unrequited love, letters of regret for a love let go (“Who’s Lovin’ You”), letters of shy love (“Stupid Things”, a duet with Reese Witherspoon)…and each and every one of them beautiful. I felt deeply and undeniably loved from many corners and I cannot say this enough:

Thank you, Ben. I love you! ^_^ And I know that I am loved.