I am lying on the bed that I share with my sisters. June is on one side, and April is on the other. We are lying sideways in a row, on our stomachs, with our feet hanging over the side. We each have a book on the bed in front of us, turning the pages with a “whumph” as we read. I am reading ‘Anne of Green Gables’, and I’m just coming to an exciting part about the day Anne dyes her hair and it comes out green. I know it is coming, because June has already talked about it.
We have a rule about not telling each other too much about a story if we get to it first, but last week June was chuckling and laughing while reading this, and I just had to know.
“Why are you laughing?” I looked across at her, as she was reading at the table.
“It’s just sooo funny!” she gives me an impish look, and laughs some more.
“What’s so funny? Tell me,” I beg.
“Well, Anne hates her red hair, you know,” June begins, “So she gets some dye and she and Diana decide to…”
“No, no, stop telling me,” I say, as she carries right on, she is like a runaway train.
“STOP telling me!” I demand, and she finally stops, but I’m afraid now, as I get to this passage, that the suspense might be ruined.
Fortunately, though, June only got to the place where Marilla goes upstairs to get a candle, and finds Anne lying face down on her bed, crying.
I’m getting to that part now, so I get off the bed and move to the front step—I want to make sure I don’t start laughing out loud, and wreck it for April, who will read the story next. I make myself slow down, so I can savor every delicious word of this latest misadventure. I know I am getting close:
“Then all at once I saw the bottle of hair dye. The peddler said it was warranted to dye any hair a beautiful raven black and wouldn’t wash off. In a trice I saw myself with beautiful raven-black hair and the temptation was irresistible.”
And soon, I get to the part where Anne dissolves into tears and moans and wails in the way that we, growing up on our farm, under our mother’s practical eye, would never be allowed:
“Oh, Marilla, what shall I do?” questioned Anne in tears. “I can never live this down. People have pretty well forgotten my other mistakes–the liniment cake and setting Diana drunk and flying into a temper with Mrs. Lynde. But they’ll never forget this. They will think I am not respectable. Oh, Marilla, `what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.’ That is poetry, but it is true. And oh, how Josie Pye will laugh! Marilla, I CANNOT face Josie Pye. I am the unhappiest girl in Prince Edward Island.”
Just as I am finishing this anguished passage, June joins me on the step and April follows.
“Did you get to the part where Marilla has to cut Anne’s hair?,” June asks, “And the way she moans and groans about it? It’s so, so funny!”
Then April wants to know what’s so funny, so we read the best passages to her, and then we sit there, on the shallow front step of our house on the homestead, transported to another, more interesting place, our spare surroundings forgotten, laughing and giggling ourselves silly.
It must be the laughing together, the way we are all feeling the same kind of happiness now, appreciating Anne and her dilemma. I look at June, with her lovely smile, and her long bony legs out in front of her, at April, with her cute little nose stuck in the book as she follows along, reading the words out loud, and I feel a wave of love.
I remember the books we read, Rilla of Ingleside, Wuthering Heights, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, Black Beauty, Tom Sawyer, White Fang, Penrod, Little Women, and all the others. I don’t know what makes this book so special. But I know I will remember this forever—June and April and me, sitting on the step on this lazy summer afternoon, all together and reading from the same page.
Someone chose the books wisely for the small school which included grades one through eight situated in the far north. Yes, we read them all, including Jane Eyre which I read three times. I must mention that only one teacher or in most cases a young female supervisor tried to keep more than two dozen students at task. At times I’m angry that we didn’t receive the education that we deserved (correspondence lessons mailed out to the Ed. Dept. which took a few weeks to get the results is not effective). On the other hand I feel that the experience made me stronger and more determined to attain my education which at that time seemed impossible.
Hi Ruby (June). It was always a mystery to me who chose the books—it may have been someone in the Alberta Department of Education who did the honors. We were so fortunate to have such a great selection! Reading gave us the foundation for learning that we craved, and the basic skills to continue on our own. No, we didn’t receive the education other Canadian children did, and as you know, math was a serious deficiency. But we were lucky to have parents who encouraged us, and the drive to accomplish what we did. I never forget we seven children all completed one or two degrees each. Quite an achievement. And oh, yes, the correspondence lessons we all remember will be a blog post to come! Thanks for reminding me, Ruby!
This post brings back warm memories of books I read as a kid and books I shared with Kaitlin when she was young. Thank you. 🙂
As I wrote this post, I recalled many more, but ran out of space. Reading was such a big part of most children’s lives in those days—much more than it is now. I’m working on a piece about that very issue for next week.
What a lovely memory! And you described it beautifully – how you and your sisters came to love reading and sharing your enjoyment of the stories with one another. Makes me wish I had had close siblings to share things with. Mine were too much younger to be peers and we went to different rural schools during the school year so I was almost always alone. As I am now. Funny how that tradition continues. Thanks for your wonderful memoir.
What a great comment, Rin! We have always felt fortunate to be part of such a big family, although miles apart as we age. Learning to live in close quarters with so many others was an important life lesson!
Wonderful story Mom. Thank you!
All true—it is such a vivid memory! Thanks!
Your post is full of nostalgia and brings to mind my own childhood. Not quite like your experience, but I am the eldest of four siblings, two younger brothers and the youngest the sister. The youngest is much younger but the three of us brothers are close to each other in years. In our childhood, the race was to read the weekly magazines that we used to get at home. These inevitably contained serialised stories and among the three of us the one who got to read them first has an edge over the other two who were impatient for the information.
That’s so funny, Rummuser. Ah, the realities of sibling rivalry! But because you were born in a family of four, you were privy to all of the benefits too, since competition often came with companionship. I remember serialized stories too, in a newspaper called The Family Herald, I think I got that right. The suspense as we waited for the next issue, sometimes weeks apart, was excruciating!
Lovely memories. I read most of those too, but always on my own, the family bookworm with 3 younger brothers who would rather be out causing themselves or each other bodily harm building dens, climbing trees etc. I loved the outdoors too, but would often be found sitting in the shade completely absorbed in a Victorian classic.
Quite a lovely picture, Chris. Sounds like an idyllic childhood. So glad the brothers left you alone, to your own devices!
Thanks for the visit and the comment!
Oddly, I have still never read “Anne”, obsessed as a child with horse stories. Oh, the hair though, I used a whole tube of Brylcreem on mine playing Elvis, Ma sent me to school all greasy. Sweet post Diane.
I loved horse stories as well. Remember Black Beauty, My Friend Flika, and more…It was beautiful the way the authors personalized them, we believed it was real!
So lucky to have sisters. I have 3 brothers and was often the babysitter
We are 6 sisters, with a brother sandwiched smack in the middle. As one of the older 3 girls, we longed for a big brother, who could fight our battles for us!
I loved this post. I, too, have had memorable moments when I’ve been swept with emotion and understood at the time that I’d never forget. And, also like you, some of them were shared with my sisters. I read the same books you did. Little Women was probably my favorite; I still have the copy Mom gave me for Christmas and it still falls open to the parts I read and reread. Thank you for brightening my day..
I have a very soft spot for Little Women. I always compared their idyllic family with mine, which was much more real, bickering and all! The sisters in the book (I remember Beth and Jo) always got along, always considered each other, and especially were concerned about their mother. So lovely! So not possible! I think it made us all just a little unsatisfied with our own lives!
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