{"id":748,"date":"2011-05-08T15:15:11","date_gmt":"2011-05-08T19:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.earthegy.com\/?p=748"},"modified":"2013-06-10T14:52:35","modified_gmt":"2013-06-10T18:52:35","slug":"of-mothers-and-books-and-simple-pleasures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/?p=748","title":{"rendered":"Of Mothers and Books and Simple Pleasures…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>My mother is the most brilliant woman I know.<\/p>\n

When I was young, my mom took my sister and I to the library every week without fail.<\/p>\n

It was an ominous, dusty, spidery, old place, with creaking wood floors and towering rows of steel metal shelves that looked like they\u2019d topple over at any moment.\u00a0 We had to be quiet in the library\u2026anything above a whisper was not tolerated by the blue haired woman at the front desk.<\/p>\n

But inside that library, on all those shaky shelves were books.\u00a0 Thousands of books.\u00a0 And inside those books were countless stories to be read, lands to be visited, adventures to be had,\u00a0 and rabbit holes to go down.<\/p>\n

She would leave me in the children’s section for hours\u2026.actually, I don\u2019t even remember my mom being there, but I know she\u2019s the one who took us.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall actually being abandoned there, so I imagine she was in another aisle.\u00a0 I don\u2019t remember what my sister looked at, or what section she went to…within moments I was lost, taking out book after book from a shelf, opening them up, making the very grown up decision of whether or not it was\u00a0 deserving of the limited space in the book bag my mother brought with her.<\/p>\n

I still remember that book bag.\u00a0 It was a yellow calico print, and actually the size of a large briefcase.\u00a0 Mom was smart.\u00a0 She brought a big bag.<\/p>\n

My mom, in her incredibly sneaky and subtle brilliance, taught me to enjoy the written word.<\/p>\n

The three of us packed that yellow fabric book bag full every single week with our new treasures.\u00a0 Reading commenced on the car ride home\u2026.after all, we only had one single week before all those books had to be returned.\u00a0 Renewing wasn\u2019t an option or a necessity in my family.\u00a0 We don\u2019t dilly dally with our books, we devour them.<\/p>\n

Years later, while living in Charlotte, NC, I went into my first super bookstore\u2026a Borders or Barnes & Noble, I can\u2019t remember which.\u00a0 There I discovered something even better than the library\u2026a single building, full of brand new glossy books, with the extra added perk of a cappuccino bar.\u00a0 It was okay to pull a book out and read through it while slowly nibbling on a piece of carrot cake.\u00a0 Nobody worried about crumbs, and I could take all the time I wanted in that store.\u00a0 Every subject was there, and my interests changed by the minute depending on which aisle I wandered through.\u00a0 I could start a fiction novel, or read up on holistic pet care, or find gardening advice all in one place\u2026.a place that served cappuccino and didn\u2019t have spiders or dust.\u00a0 How decadent is that???\u00a0 I was in heaven.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think I came out of that store for a good eight hours on my first visit.<\/p>\n

The super bookstores have not been good to me.\u00a0 I invariably spend way too much money for those freshly printed words that I cannot live without.\u00a0 But I\u2019ve enjoyed every second of it, and until now, it\u2019s been a secret indulgence.<\/p>\n

My first real bookmark came from one of those gigantic stores.\u00a0 They got me in the checkout aisle, the land of impulse purchases.\u00a0 There they were\u2026 beautiful beaded bookmarks on display for the rock bottom low price of about\u00a0 $15.\u00a0 Seriously….$15 for some string and glass beads???\u00a0 I had to have one.\u00a0 In fact, I had to have three\u2026one for my mom, of course, and two for me in case I ever lost the first one.\u00a0\u00a0 I still have both of mine, and their value has only increased to me.<\/p>\n

My bookmarks have joined me on my adventures.\u00a0 They\u2019ve been with me to many places, and when we take a break from our secret adventures for a small while, they mark our last stop.\u00a0 They\u2019ve gone down the rabbit hole with me, and come back out of it.\u00a0 When one story ends, they wait patiently on my nightstand for the next one to begin, sparkling slyly at me whenever the table lamp is lit.\u00a0 They\u2019ve sat with me on a cold rainy day, huddled under a cable knit throw with a dog in my lap and a fire roaring, always marking my page with grace, always ready to be taken to the next page, never complaining, never daring to leave a mark or crease a page… never marring the inherent beauty of the printed words.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

My first real bookmark still graces my bedside table<\/p><\/div>\n

My first bookmarks were the inspiration for the earthegy bookmark line, and they done their \u00a0job well.\u00a0 The bookmarks I\u2019ve made have given me a chance to share my appreciation for something so simple, yet so elegant.\u00a0 They are the resting place for mismatched gems, and random glass beads…a new purpose for something extra laying around.\u00a0 There are no design rules when making bookmarks, except for one\u2026they must respect the book and protect the written word.<\/p>\n

And I have a confession to make\u2026my earthegy bookmarks are my weakness.\u00a0\u00a0 They make no business sense. \u00a0They don\u2019t make a profit, and even if purchased in bulk, the sale doesn\u2019t add up to much.\u00a0 But they give me something else. \u00a0 They\u2019ll be marking a page for someone that shares my love for the written word, adding a little sparkle to their bedside table, and joining that person in their adventures.\u00a0 That is enough.<\/p>\n

To view all earthegy products, please visit my shop.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My mother is the most brilliant woman I know. When I was young, my mom took my sister and I to the library every week without fail. It was an ominous, dusty, spidery, old place, with creaking wood floors and towering rows of steel metal shelves that looked like they\u2019d topple over at any moment.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-info"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=748"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":762,"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748\/revisions\/762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.earthegy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}