Welcome to The Club v3.3 Summer 2023

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First Love Affair
My first love affair did
not involve a member of
the opposite sex, and it
had nothing to do with
the forbidden territory
of same sex attractions.
Such things, in my
youth, were barely
whispered about. I
didn’t have a crush on a
movie star, and I certainly didn’t fancy
any of my schoolteachers or distant
cousins, even the ‘kissing’ cousin variety.
None of the above: no, my first love affair
had absolutely nothing to do with sex
at all. I simply fell victim to an undying
infatuation with books.
The very first book I can remember
was made of brown linen that was
indestructible, at least in the hands of
a toddler. It was an ABC book in bright
colours with no more than six or eight
pages. I couldn’t have been much more
than three when that treasure came into
my life. I loved that book as much as I
loved my teddy bear and my stuffed dog
“Rags.” I think I loved them all more
than my parents. And yes, I took them
By Maryleah Otto, Gravenhurst • from Daytripping Nov-Dec 2013
to bed to hold close to me all night long.
I suppose I actually learned the alphabet
from that funny old book. The linen
became soft and crumpled, the edges
slightly frayed in time. Some of the
pictures faded, but I loved the book all
the more. It was still among my dearest
possessions by the time I was ready for
school.
In first grade I was introduced to a
very different book, one called Mary,
John and Peter, the standard primary
reader for Ontario schoolchildren during
the 1930s. I can’t say I was intrigued by
the colourless, boring story of these three
forgettable moppets, but at least I learned
to read. Meantime, at Christmas and on
my birthday, kindly aunts gave me copies
of When We Were Very Young by A. A.
Milne and later Swiss Family Robinson
and Robinson Crusoe, or Blackie’s Girls’
Annual, a marvelous compendium of
exciting if proper tales of young girls, as
well as some poems, pictures and trivia.
These books came from England and
they were hugely popular. There was, of
course, a Blackie’s Boys’ Annual too. But
no one ever gave me that.
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Sometime during the second or third
grade, our teacher led us all in a line to
the local public library where we were
allowed to buy, for a dime, a library card
of our very own. Oh joy of joys! A whole
library full of wonders and delights! I read
Black Beauty, Beautiful Joe, Heidi, Little
Women, Pollyanna, The Water Babies and
countless other children’s classics. And
every Saturday morning, the librarian, a
beautiful Irish woman with flaming red
hair and green eyes, Miss Isobel O’Brien,
took a group of us into the story room
where we sat on carpeted steps in front
of a real log fire and listened to myths,
legends and folktales from all over the
world and all periods of history. I thought
I’d died and gone to heaven!
When I was about twelve, I discovered
series books. It wasn’t Nancy Drew—
perhaps I was ahead of those—but it was
a series called Grace Harlowe and Her
Overland Riders. The heroine, usually
up in the saddle of her favorite horse,
galloped through almost every state in
the Union. The books were American,
triumphing over ‘the bad guys.’ Not
surprisingly, she had a boyfriend, Hippy,
who came to be not only the heroine’s
romantic attachment, but mine too. After
all, I was on the cusp of puberty! These
novels cost 25 cents each and I saved
every penny and nickel I could to buy
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the next in the series. I think there were
at least a dozen of them. I lined them
all up on a bookshelf in our living room
and admired the effect greatly. A couple
of years later, we moved to a different
house, and my mother took a notion to
give away my precious books. She knew
I had read them so no doubt she thought
I wouldn’t miss them. But I did! I still do!
I don’t think I ever really forgave her.
High school English courses brought
my introduction to Shakespeare, the
great poets of England, and Latin classics.
Even struggling with the Latin text, I
was moved, sometimes to tears, by the
beauty of the story and the language.
My favorite was Virgil’s Aeneid. When
I entered university, I chose to study
the literature of France and Germany.
Once again, my mind and heart were
opened to wonders beyond my wildest
imagination.
I think the ending of my little story is
predictable. Yes, I became a librarian and
a writer. Both have brought me continued
joy and a sense of fulfillment. Books still
sit on the night table beside my bed. No
need for sleeping pills when a fine new
novel can be cracked open and savoured
until the eyelids grow heavy and sleep is
only a few more seconds away. And to
think that it all started with a linen ABC
book many many decades ago.
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Summer 2023 “The stuff that dreams are made of.” -The Maltese Falcon, 1941
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