"When I left Queen's my future seemed to stretch out before me like a straight road. I thought I could see along it for many a milestone. Now there is a bend in it. I don't know what lies around the bend, but I'm going to believe that the best does. It has a fascination of its own, that bend, Marilla. I wonder how the road beyond it goes - what there is of green glory and soft, checkered light and shadows - what new landscapes - what new beauties - what curves and hills and valleys further on."
I finished my re-read of Anne of Green Gables last weekend, and promptly found a set of the first four Anne books on ebay for £5 since my copy is battered and I only ever had the later ones from the library as a child. I'd forgotten this sage piece of advice for looking at unexpected changes in your life. I love the idea of a path that sometimes forks unexpectedly. I always remember loving the Around the Riverbend song from Pocahontas better than Colours of the Wind when it first came out (coincidentally, about the same time as I would have been first reading Anne - 1994/5 was a time, for sure!) and there's something of the same sentiment in that, I think. Whether encountering an unpredictable turn or choosing the road less travelled, looking for the bright spots and the "new landscapes - new beauties" is the best way.
Also, this quote is so accurate for me:
"she thought of her own white room at Green Gables, where should would have the pleasant consciousness of a great, green, still outdoors, of sweet peas growing in the garden, and moonlight falling on the orchard, of the brook below the slope and the spruce boughs tossing in the night wind beyond it, of a vast starry sky, and the light from Diana's window shining out through the gap in the trees. Here there was nothing of this; Anne knew that outside her window was a hard street, with a network of telephone wires shutting out the sky, the tramp of alien feet, and a thousand lights gleaming on stranger faces."
Being in towns and cities always feels a bit like being imprisoned - by man-made things, by concrete and steel and tarmac. Whenever I've lived in cities for spaces of time these are the things I've found hardest - not being able to step outdoors barefooted and feel the earth beneath my skin; having to look up to see the sky; the hard abrasiveness of every surface; the falsity of the green spaces, parks and commons all manufactured and manicured and sculpted. I read this last weekend and had that choke in my chest like wanting to cry for the comfort of seeing your own thoughts and feelings in someone else's words.
Anne Shirley was such a formative character for me when I first met her, age 10. Coming back to her now is fascinating, seeing so much of the child I was, the teenager she helped me grow into, and the grown up I am now, still there in her pages. The joy in and love for the natural world that surrounds her. The overzealous imagination. The love for the familiar in spite of the imagined excitement for the different. The intensity of friendship and the loyalty to her "bosom companion" Diana. The tempestuous rage that she grows out of. I'm so glad I decided to re-read and remember and re-discover her, and I'm thrilled already for those later books to arrive in the post. They had adorable cute cover illustrations, and I don't think I ever even read Windy Willows/Poplars and beyond, as I'm pretty sure our tiny library only ever had the first three. Hopefully I'll be able to track down the last two books to match this four-set at some point too.
"And I came to the conclusion, Marilla, that I wasn't born for city life and that I was glad of it. It's nice to be eating ice-cream and brilliant restaurants at eleven o'clock at night once in a while; but as a regular thing I'd rather be in the east gable at eleven, sound asleep, but kind of knowing even in my sleep that the stars were shining outside and that the wind was blowing in the firs across the brook."
I finished my re-read of Anne of Green Gables last weekend, and promptly found a set of the first four Anne books on ebay for £5 since my copy is battered and I only ever had the later ones from the library as a child. I'd forgotten this sage piece of advice for looking at unexpected changes in your life. I love the idea of a path that sometimes forks unexpectedly. I always remember loving the Around the Riverbend song from Pocahontas better than Colours of the Wind when it first came out (coincidentally, about the same time as I would have been first reading Anne - 1994/5 was a time, for sure!) and there's something of the same sentiment in that, I think. Whether encountering an unpredictable turn or choosing the road less travelled, looking for the bright spots and the "new landscapes - new beauties" is the best way.
Also, this quote is so accurate for me:
"she thought of her own white room at Green Gables, where should would have the pleasant consciousness of a great, green, still outdoors, of sweet peas growing in the garden, and moonlight falling on the orchard, of the brook below the slope and the spruce boughs tossing in the night wind beyond it, of a vast starry sky, and the light from Diana's window shining out through the gap in the trees. Here there was nothing of this; Anne knew that outside her window was a hard street, with a network of telephone wires shutting out the sky, the tramp of alien feet, and a thousand lights gleaming on stranger faces."
Being in towns and cities always feels a bit like being imprisoned - by man-made things, by concrete and steel and tarmac. Whenever I've lived in cities for spaces of time these are the things I've found hardest - not being able to step outdoors barefooted and feel the earth beneath my skin; having to look up to see the sky; the hard abrasiveness of every surface; the falsity of the green spaces, parks and commons all manufactured and manicured and sculpted. I read this last weekend and had that choke in my chest like wanting to cry for the comfort of seeing your own thoughts and feelings in someone else's words.
Anne Shirley was such a formative character for me when I first met her, age 10. Coming back to her now is fascinating, seeing so much of the child I was, the teenager she helped me grow into, and the grown up I am now, still there in her pages. The joy in and love for the natural world that surrounds her. The overzealous imagination. The love for the familiar in spite of the imagined excitement for the different. The intensity of friendship and the loyalty to her "bosom companion" Diana. The tempestuous rage that she grows out of. I'm so glad I decided to re-read and remember and re-discover her, and I'm thrilled already for those later books to arrive in the post. They had adorable cute cover illustrations, and I don't think I ever even read Windy Willows/Poplars and beyond, as I'm pretty sure our tiny library only ever had the first three. Hopefully I'll be able to track down the last two books to match this four-set at some point too.
"And I came to the conclusion, Marilla, that I wasn't born for city life and that I was glad of it. It's nice to be eating ice-cream and brilliant restaurants at eleven o'clock at night once in a while; but as a regular thing I'd rather be in the east gable at eleven, sound asleep, but kind of knowing even in my sleep that the stars were shining outside and that the wind was blowing in the firs across the brook."
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