Goldilocks and Troutbirder

Friends Romans Countrymen I'm still way behind reading the Decline and Fall of Your Empire. Also thereupon neglecting my book review blog.  Whereas, I shall now make amends by going back almost as far as the Roman Empire by recalling a favorite book of childhood wisdom introduced to me by my mother..... Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

 

At the table in the kitchen, there were three bowls of porridge.  Goldilocks was hungry.  She tasted the porridge from the first bowl.

 "This porridge is too hot!" she exclaimed.

 So, she tasted the porridge from the second bowl.

 "This porridge is too cold," she said

 So, she tasted the last bowl of porridge.

 "Ahhh, this porridge is just right," she said happily and she ate it all up.

From the wisdom of our mothers and childhood lessons.   Perhaps our leaders in Washington and all of us as citizens should cool down and warm up to working together and make it "just right."...:)

Jesus The Outlaw

Not a book review this time. Just a message passed on by our friends Don and Sandy. Details found by jumping to my other blog .... Troutbirder. :)  Merry Christmas.

The Dog Park

The Dog Park a wonderful recent book....ooops, sorry,

it's not a new book it's a poster I ran across during a recent political campaign.

Away at War : A Civil War story of the Family Left Behind

By Nick K. Adams

From September of 1861 through September of 1863 the authors great great grandfather Griffen wrote at least 100 letters from the fields of battle back to the family he left behind on the southeastern Minnesota prairie. He had left his wife and three small children on their little farm while he fought to save the Union.  It is a true story of survival of that  family on the Minnesota frontier. And most amazingly less that fifteen minutes from where Mrs. T. and I live. Of course, I’m also familiar with the story of another pioneer woman who lived briefly in our town of Spring Valley. That was Laura Ingalls who married Almonzo of the local Wilder family. More bragging on all that later…J

While the novel tells story of the “family left behind” it is all based on one hundred letters the soldier/father  wrote them during his two years of service. Those real letters  describe everything he is experiencing and thinking about, as well as responding to their communications of both hardships and endurance. It is a Civil War novel as real as life can get. 

The slow, terrifying  waiting for news, waiting for spring, waiting for his return, touch the heart.  This is a well crafted story indeed.  Minerva, her three young children, alone in a shanty on the prairie, and a few nearby fellow settlers  struggle to survive.  Can they run a near wilderness farm like this one on the own. The  three child are all 7 and under.

Minnesota’s seasons dictate their activities.  Away at War introduces the reader to the terrible impact, the pain and anxiety, and the untold suffering war causes family members left behind. A moving chronicle of the experience of war and a compelling story with relevant historical references. Of course, the place where this story really took place I’m very familiar with  so that enhances a good story even more. If you liked Little House On The Prairie I suspect you would like this one as well….. It's a bit grittier and kept me enthralled.  I don’t know if this book qualifies as a “young adult novel” but I’m sure my grandchildren would enjoy reading it and I'll love to talk to them about it this Christmas....:)

 

 

 

                                                                         

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@Barrie Summy