Sad but with toys

Okay...this is probably completely uninteresting to most. But, I found the line that I was discussing in a previous blog in my review of "Songs Without Words."

Liz, who is the mother of the teen who attempts the ultimate act of desperation, is reflecting on a friendship that she had with a mother of three children, one of which was a newborn. The new mother is sensitive to the hardships of older children when younger siblings are introduced into the home. She remembers the woman asking friends to please not send gifts to her older children, because the oldest, when the second child was born had received various offerings which were really "just an unsuccessful distraction, making this sad little girl sad but with toys."

Liz rambles on for a few more paragraphs in her distraught state of misery following her daughter's suicide attempt. She contemplates the actions to take with her daughter who is now home from the hospital and she maneuvers through random thoughts about her day and what she does and similarly does not feel like doing. To put it simply, she is moving methodically through her day with no real goal in mind. She has reached a numb sort of misery at this point.

Soon after this, she recalls that "Right after New Year's she'd ordered some luxurious new sheets from a catalog having a white sale: pale yellow Egyptian cotton, 420 thread count. She was sad but with bed linens."

This may seem to be hokey or even rather simple to some. But to me, sometimes it's the smallest things that reach down and pull you up. I loved these paragraphs. I know that there are people out there who have invented airplanes and all and that in comparison, well, this is pretty small. But wow...it's my idea of beautiful. Even in a "just okay" novel.

My creative streak is dwindling today. I think that perhaps during my flight yesterday evening, I must have scattered all of my wit from the plane, where it is now blowing through the trees somewhere around some farmland in northern Georgia. In this same farm field, an introverted cow is wondering why today, of all days, he seems to be the life of the party.

Sincerely,

Happy With Dogs