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Surprise Gift

 We are still planning on going to Florida. The plan was to sell the condo and head down, then look for a house there. Some aspects of that may have changed. I will just roll with it.

Before the hurricane news I volunteered some time at the Burlington Book Festival -- working at the used book sale to benefit a local library and the writers' workshops. Because we are packing things up, I resisted the urge to buy books for myself.

More importantly, I did not tell Don exactly what I was doing. He runs a one man book rescue. Doesn't matter if he will read them or not, doesn't matter if we have a place to put them, doesn't even matter so much about condition. If it's an old book even better. No books will go in the trash on his watch. ANd then there was the bargain aspect. Honestly, don't judge. He would have loaded up his pick up truck.

Yesterday I sent him to an antique furniture sales and restoration place to get some wood restoring paste. Unfortunately that section of the antique mall was closed and he ended up wandering around other consignment booths. He came home with a gift for me and guess what it was!

 


He said he spotted it and immediately thought of me. But before we get all "OH, what a sweet and thoughtful man" about him, he also said he thought maybe I read it as a child. The copyright date is 1909.

Comments

  1. Miss MerryOctober 6, 2022 at 9:24 AM

    I'm a Don. No old book goes unrescued.

    ReplyDelete
  2. MaebemeOctober 6, 2022 at 11:00 AM

    LOL! I probably shouldn't laugh but I am. What a guy.
    Good luck with the trip to Florida.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Arkansas PattiOctober 6, 2022 at 4:10 PM

    Aww, that was sweet. I use to treasure books till the last time I moved and realized most of my moving weight was books and I really had no place for them here. I still rescue, but I then find homes for them.

    ReplyDelete
  4. RianOctober 6, 2022 at 6:16 PM

    I agree that I can't throw away a book... there's just something wrong about that... someone might get some enjoyment from it. And my kids once bought me an old "Uncle Wiggily' book they found. It's copyright is 1921... and I did read Uncle Wiggley's stories when I was young.

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  5. Linda ReederOctober 6, 2022 at 7:48 PM

    I laughed! That's a good thing.

    ReplyDelete
  6. TaborOctober 6, 2022 at 8:15 PM

    It was purchased with love and I am sure he thought your read it as a reprint. I will never live in Florida, although my husband would move there in the blink of an eye. This is not over for that state, so buy on very high land, please.

    ReplyDelete
  7. gigi-hawaiiOctober 7, 2022 at 10:16 AM

    What a hoot. That last line made me laugh. Seems like you two get along just fine. As for living in Florida full time, I don't know about that.

    ReplyDelete
  8. KayOctober 9, 2022 at 8:36 PM

    OMG! That's so funny! We had to sell/donate almost all our books when we moved back to Hawaii 14 years ago. Now we don't buy paper books. Uuummm.... Oops! I did buy two books but only because it was my cousin who wrote them and I wanted to support him. Otherwise, it's all Kindle.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Linda MyersOctober 9, 2022 at 9:23 PM

    I read the book as a kid in the 50s. Sweet of Don to think of you, even if it was an excuse to buy yet another book. My husband Art usually buys me food. Re our winter homes - ours is in Arizona - we keep a close eye on weather trends. Increasing heat there, and decreasing water, is one of the reasons we still have our Washington place. We're lucky to have options, don't you think?

    ReplyDelete
  10. OlgaOctober 10, 2022 at 9:17 AM

    The writing style certainly is for a generation not raised on electronic devices -- complex sentence structures that run for lines!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Terra October 20, 2022 at 12:11 AM

    Ha ha, we did not read that book when it was newly published. I am a librarian and a bit of a book rescuer myself.

    ReplyDelete

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