My Story Box

I found an old box in the other house at the farm. It was dirty and gross and the top was all bubbly, and not in a nice way. I brought it home anyway, and took the vacuum to it. The main thing to do, initially, was to rid it of cobwebs and the wallpaper that lined it. Literally, and figuratively. What did it hold initially? There was nothing in it, so I don't know. Who made it? The tinker, Uncle Billy? Perhaps.

My mother sent it off to be refinished, and it returned as a clean, lovely, shiny box, much like it must have looked when somebody made it. She wanted to have it for Christmas, so she could put some little things in it. Her wish didn't come true, as it came back in the new year. I'm sorry she was disappointed - not because I didn't get the little things in it, but because she couldn't put them in it.

She asked me what I am going to put in my box. I thought, perhaps, my crochet threads. But, no. I have a place for them. I thought of it last night. I get a lot of ideas on my pillow. Even though I have a new pillow, I still get the ideas, so it can't be the pillow, but the placing of my head thereon.

It is a story box. I will tell stories inspired by my box. I will encourage others to tell stories. Sometimes it just takes a little story to make somebody think of their story. But, mostly, I will think of it as my story box, so I won't be disappointed when nobody else puts a story in it.

What did I put in my box this morning? Stories. Other peoples stories. Some of my favourites, representing my family. I could do a lot with books, and I will, but for today, I'll just tell what stories I put in it and why.

In the back is Pookie. Aunt Phyl sent me this book when I was a little girl. Probably it had my cousins' names on the tag, but I know who really bought it, as they were as young as I was and younger. It's about a rabbit with wings, and a heart which breaks in two, but Belinda mends it with love and her work basket. 

Then there is "The Silver Chalice." A good read. There weren't many books in the Vasseur family, but I nabbed this one from the bookshelf in the den in the house in Grand Falls. 

Next, in red, is a "Happy Hollisters" mystery. Those Hollister kids bravely solved many mysteries with no help from adults, and entertained me for hours.

 "Rose Under Fire" comes next. That is the last book I read. Was it a good read? Yes. Was it a happy read? No. Did it have a happy ending? How could it?

"Anne of Green Gables." Love the Anne girl and her many books. But her journals - five edited books of them. Oh, how sad.

"A Tree Grows in Brooklyn." That came from my Moore grandparents bookshelf, which I have, and has Gramp's autograph on the fly leaf. A good old read. And many memories of that book shelf, and Gram scoffing, "those books are too old for you." I wasn't reading them. I was the LIBRARIAN. 

"Wee Sir Gibbie." My favourite author, George MacDonald. I have a large collection of these leather books on my bookshelf in my bedroom. They were generally scanned from the originals, and include many paragraphs in the Scots, which I have learned to read considerably well. They make a very handsome shelf, as well.

"Keeper of the bees." Gene Stratton Porter, a naturalist from another era, and a writer of novels about same. I have many of her books. 

"Kazam." From the farm, with Gramp Holmes "Floyd" written in the fly leaf. A good book about wolves.

"Heidi." Such a beautiful book.

You can hardly see it, but "Cinderella" comes next; a very old Cinderella. It was in the desk in the kitchen at the farm. Along with other children's books.

The little turquoise book is my grandmother Holmes one year diary. Those who knew her get a chuckle from this diary. "No visitors today. Cindy and Greg were here." Bless them and those who visited often enough that they were not company.

Next is my Grandmother Moore's date book, with 1907 written on the front. In it are mostly birthdays and a few deaths.

Last is my Grandfather Holmes's New Testament. Inside it says, "Presented by the Canadian Bible Society (British & Foreign Bible Society) to the Canadian Soldiers in the war of 1914. 'Be strong and of a good courage.'" Gramp wrote on the next page, "Pt Floyd O Holmes. 1st Depot. Battalion. 10 Platoon. Camp. Sussex."

I could have added many more, but my box was full.

I think I will have fun with my box. Join me if you wish. What will I put in it next?

"If the book we're reading doesn't wake us up with a blow to the head, what are we reading for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us. That is my belief." - Franz Kafka