Compared to some I've seen, I barely qualify as a packrat. Compared to those in my life who are not so grievously burdened by sentiment, though, I'm the leading candidate. But what the hell am I supposed to do with this? Pulled from a box of random stuff, and thus far mercifully spared my daughter's inquisition: Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "Tales of the White Mills and Sketches". Riverside Literature Series #40. February, 1899. Cambridge: Riverside Press (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.) Single number: $0.15 Double number: $0.30 Yearly subscription (16 numbers): $0.80 I believe I met my great-grandmother. I believe I've seen pictures of her holding me as a baby. I do not remember her at all, though. And this small volume is marked with her handwriting as a young girl: How far that little candle throws his beams! So shine a good deed in a naughty world. Shakespeare In the bright lexicon of youth There's no such word as fail (Illegible) "Where there is a will, theres a way." He can do anything he thinks he can. • • • "Every man has in himself a continent of undiscovered character. Happy is he who acts the Columbus to his own soul." • • • Better not be at all than not be noble (Tennyson) • • • Aren't you glad, bet I was. Should not think he would do it again. I also came across a damaged copy of Scott's The Lady of the Lake, from the Popular Educator Library (v.IX, n.36), published in October, 1901 by the Educational Publishing Co., 50 Bromfield St., Boston. The cover is partially damaged, but I can tell you that the PEL was published quarterly at a cost of $0.40/year. The handwriting on this is a little harder to decipher (mostly faded), but one clear passage suggests the girls were using blank spaces to pass notes to one another: Bess is not a bad looking girl do you think so? • • • (illegible) (is awarded) like a horse. That last is scribbled at the spine on the back page. The first word is actually scratched out. I can't be sure about the phrase "is awarded", but that's what it looks like. I've already learned something, though. There's an American expression (probably in other countries, too) that's dying out of late. To "cross the t's and dot the i's" is, of course, a statement of attention to detail. As I look through the handwriting, I'm starting to see where it comes from. Even when she writes her name in a beautiful, even hand, the t in Schultz is not crossed (on two out of three occasions so far discovered). Absolutely, delightfully fascinating. There's nobody left alive to ask who Bess was.
A while back, I came across some old family photos. Taken somewhere in the early 19-hundreds, some even earlier. The pictures look blurred, making me wonder where the person ends and space begins. Odd, how we usually tend to think of personal delineations as sharp lines - yet where are they ...
