Once upon a time, I was a poor college student. I didn't have a lot of money to spend on luxuries. And any book besides a textbook was a luxury for me.
So I used to go to a bookstore, pull a book off the shelf, find a quiet, private corner, and read. One day I was in Barnes & Noble, running my fingers along the spines of the books, when my hand stopped at a beautiful red-and-gold hardcover. I pulled it off the shelf. It was Griffin & Sabine: An Extraordinary Correspondence, by Nick Bantock.
For those of you unfamiliar with this book, let me describe it. Griffin & Sabine is no ordinary book. It is a collection of letters between two people who live in different worlds. The pages are printed with handwritten postcards, and there are actual envelopes affixed to some of the pages, with a letter inside that you draw out to read. It is a masterpiece of art and literature, lushly romantic. I fell in love with this book the moment I opened it.
I wanted to own this book so badly. But it was expensive. More than that, it was part of a trilogy, and the boxed set of all three books was in the range of $50. That was a fortune to me at the time. So instead of buying, I returned again and again to the bookstore, pulled the books off the shelf, and read them over and over.
Later that year, I met a boy. He was sweet and funny and interesting. After a few dates, I deemed him worthy enough to share Griffin & Sabine with. So I took him to the bookstore and introduced him. I watched his face as he read the book for the first time. "This is amazing," he told me after he'd turned the last page.
Worthy, indeed.
He was a poor college student like me. But when my birthday rolled around a couple of months later, he handed me a heavy package. I knew what it was before I ripped the paper off.
It was the complete boxed set of the trilogy.
That boxed set sits on the bookshelf that I have reserved for Very Special Books (Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and The Song of the Lioness series by Tamora Pierce). And the boy?
I married him.
*****
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Happy Holidays!
