My Mom’s favorite books…

And why we spent our summers growing up in the public library in Austin.

We all want our mothers to love us.
I think Freud said that. Or maybe it was Mick Jagger.
Anyway, my mother loved books! She would throw us in the old country squire station wagon
and cart her four kids to the Austin public library most nearly every day, or at least it seemed like
that-Which was fine because it was summer in Austin, and no one had air conditioning in those
days.

Opening those big old brass doors, the cool air was like a blast from Heaven. The doors
themselves like Saint Peter’s arms throwing open and inviting us in if only for a limited time.
Once there, my mom would ensconce herself in the mystery section of the
great reading room. My younger sister would sit obediently beside her and color as mom read
while my two older brothers and I played epic games of ‘Hide-and-Seek’. The small space
underneath the card-catalog kiosk was my go-to hiding spot. If it was taken, I would head over to
the reference section and hide up in the empty shelves above the Encyclopedia Britannica’s.

Sometimes the fiction section would beckon me, and you could find me wedged behind John
Updike and Saul Bellow in one game. Only to find me crouched down behind a wall of Gore
Vidal bestsellers in the next game. My oldest brother was pre-occupied with the Johnathan Swift
Adventure series. While my middle brother grew into a big Herman Wouk and James Michener
fan. Both of which attracted me as well.

My mother’s favorite books were everything. She loved giant biographies by David McCallum,
Jon Meachum, or anything by Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Attached to this blog, is a photograph of her bookshelf near her bed.
When she passed the only thing I asked for were these books. They never arrived.
But I did get a picture before I left Austin in 2018. All great books as you can see.
Even my first communion missile on the bottom shelf which she always kept for some reason.
I guess she loved it. I guess she loved me.

And I know she loved books -
Especially mystery books or detective stories or whodunits.
She could read ten to twenty books a week, I kid you not.
We would walk out with books by the armfuls. Most all were for my mom.

She read all the time. She would read anything and books about everything.
Occasionally, the newspaper, Newsweek, or Time magazine but most always books.

Once we were on a family vacation in Jamaica. She, my sister, and I
were on a tour bus and I was in awe of the jungle and wildlife on this amazing dirt road. There were giant parrots - three feet tall - on the branches of
dense banana trees with old guys living in bamboo huts on the side of
the road. I was spellbound. I looked over at my mom to gauge her reaction and she is
reading a bridge book. Yes, you read that correctly, a bridge book. The card
game not the structure. A book describing certain bridge games along with
small schematics of the cards and the order in which they were played.

Yeah, I know. Me too.
But like I said she loved to read books. Plus, she did love playing bridge as well.
So, reading a book about bridge games was a form of ecstasy for my mom.
In my advertising days we would have called that a classic ‘two-for’.
Two for the price of one. Actually, it was two of her favorite things which made
it more like a two-for sandwich. Or a thing-on-a-thing.

All during my advertising career I would work on my own manuscripts at night and on
weekends. Whenever I felt like I had something good I would send it to her. She was forever
wonderfully and consistently critical. She always wanted to write and greatly admired my
discipline and effort, but that would be about it. But isn’t that how you get better?
The answer is, yes, it is.

I wanted to write a book my mom would love.
Yes, I know, Sigmund, - so by association she would love me.

I started this book the Monday I returned from her funeral. I felt like she read every word of it with me as I wrote. My book will be on her shelf someday somewhere somehow.