Mother Didn't Understand That Children Aren't Frightened

She'd Slept Terribly The Night Before. The Room, The Bed, Were Both Comfortable Enough, But She'd Been Plagued With Strange Dreams, The Sort That Lingered Upon Waking But Slithered Away From Memory As She Tried To Grasp Them. Only The Tendrils Of Discomfort Remained.

I'm Good With Words, But Not The Spoken Kind; I've Often Thought What A Marvelous Thing It Would Be If I Could Only Conduct Relationships On Paper.

I Probably Coughed Self-pityingly In Response, Little Aware That I Was About To Cross A Tremendous Threshold Beyond Which There Would Be No Return, That In My Hands I Held An Object Whose Simple Appearance Belied Its Profound Power. All True Readers Have A Book, A Moment, Like The One I Describe, And When Mum Offered Me That Much-read Library Copy Mine Was Upon Me.

Memory Is A Cruel Mistress With Whom We All Must Learn To Dance.

She Felt Like A Fictional Character Who'd Escaped The Book In Which Her Creator Had Carefully And Kindly Trapped Her, Taken A Pair Of Scissors To Her Outline And Leaped, Free.