Books, films and music have always held the very best magic for me. The first song I ever remember hearing on the radio was Let It Be, late at night on my brother’s old black box. Any one of my family can attest that I was completely obsessed with the movie The Three Lives of Thomasina. I was enchanted by the funeral procession the children held for the cat, Thomasina, though the wee Scottish village, and the beautiful “witch” who resurrected her. I must have seen it dozens of times, at a time when you couldn’t just go out & buy a movie, you had to wait for it to come to the theater or tv. When I was around 10 I read Jane Eyre, and I still feel cold and bereft at the thought of Jane’s friend at the orphanage dying in her arms. And don’t get me started on Grimm’s Fairy Tales. I was (and am) fascinated with them, the real, dark ones, not the Disney-fied versions. They are probably where many of my ideas of right and wrong (and more than a few nightmares) originated.
One of the unexpected bonuses of having a child is that you get to witness all the great books, movies and music with them. When I was just pregnant with my girl, F & I started to read Harry Potter out loud, even nicknaming her Hermoine. Since then I have caught my daughter’s looks of a sort of kindly disdain as I have wept deeply, and with amazing regularity at, for example, House at Pooh Corner, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron , The Secret Garden…..
I’ve stayed away from pop music since I was a kid. My Ipod is a boomer mix of alt-rock-country-indie-folk-afro-cuban-world :) music. But I am loving the morning blend H & I listen to on the way to school, performed by some righteous women. So, at her age I was listening to These Boots Are Made For Walking,Love Child, Lay Down (Candles In The Rain), We get our groove on, loud, then I leave her with the daily reminder to “shine your light, girl”.
(to listen, hit the pop-out player button)
Beauty Mountain 
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