Way Before Hurricane Kyle, Maine worried about...

UndergroundLibrarian@evpl — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 21:13:00 GMT

Okay, Kyle veered away from Maine, but the news about it a few days ago reminded me of an old favorite picture book, Time of Wonder by Robert Mccloskey, the 1958 Caldecott award winner for the best picture book of the year. It has beautiful pictures, of course, some of my favorites being all the gulls sitting on ledges facing in the same direction, and the illustration to go with "You snap off the light and row toward the dock as the stars are gazing down, their reflections gazing up." McCloskey's watercolor shows the stars in the sky and then reflected in the water -- it's so beautiful and peaceful that I just want to keep looking at it. But what recently made me think of this book comes later, when everyone everywhere sees signs of bad weather coming, and they all make preparations for an oncoming hurricane. They endure it inside their house all night long (with no electricity), and next morning they go outside to "explore the tops of giant fallen trees." This is my kind of hurricane -- no mention of injury or property damage past those fallen trees.

In rereading this book today, I realized that in spite of the hurricane part, reading this book slowed me down, and gave me an opportunity to experience a "TIme of Wonder" myself. Guess that's what all the good books do, right, put you right there inside them?

Kids Blog : Maine

Way Before Hurricane Kyle, Maine worried about...