When I say "I started reading my favorite book tonight." Most of you know what that means.
"My Friend Flicka"
Yes. I am going to put a couple of my favorite parts on here so that you can sample them and hopefully be tempted to read the whole thing. WARNING: What you are about to read, in my humble opinion, is a portion of the most beautifully written book I have ever read in my life. Time and time again I have pulled this book off my shelf. It is red and plain on the front, with pages that are turning yellow on the edges, and its just wonderful.
We'll start at the beginning and I'll skip around a little. The first page is just delicious.
"High up on the long hill they called the Saddle Back, behind the ranch and the county road, the boy sat his horse, facing east, his eyes dazzled by the rising sun.
It seemed like a personage come to visit; appearing all of a sudden over the dark bank of clouds in the east, coming up over the edge of it smiling; bowing right and left; lighting up the whole world so that everything smiled back.
The snug, huddled roofs of the ranch house, way below him, began to be red instead of just dark; and the spidery arms of the windmill in the gorge glinted and twinkled. They were smiling back at the sun.
"Good morning, mister!" shouted Ken, swinging his arm in salute, and the chunky brown mare he rode gave a wild leap.
* * * * *
An echoing whistle pierced the silence. The train was approaching the Tie Siding corssing.
The cows were moving into the corral-that little black post was Tim, fastening the gate back.
It wouldn't be long before breakfast. Everybody was awake. Going downstairs, his mother would call, "Time to get up, boys!" His father was sitting up in bed with his hair rumpled, pajamas rumpled, hand reaching out for a cigar.
Gosh- if his father had read the reports! And that wasn't all, there was the saddle blanket too, the lost saddle blanket.
He turned from looking at the ranch house and let his eyes sweep the hillside. Saddle blanket, saddle blanket-everytime he asked his father for a colt, McLaughin said, I'll give you one when you deserve one-not before. It might be caught on a shrub, or a rock-or lying in a gully. Lucky I woke up early. Howard will be sore that I didn't wake him. He always wants to go along. He can never wake up, but I can-
* * * * *
Nell picked up the little bright oval rugs. "Here, Ken, you might take these out and shake them for me-"
She went over to the sink and ran hot water into the dishpan.
Standing there she could look out the door and watch him shaking the rugs slowly-making a game of it-trying to scare the dogs; and it took her back to when she was a little girl and her mother had made her shake the rugs out of doors after breakfast. That was at the Cape Cod cottage when it had begun to be too hot to stay in Boston-
The water filled the dishpan-
She used to shake them very slowly, one by one, looking around, sniffing the salt tang in the air, listening to the soft boom of the breakers on the beach until her mother's voice inside would call her to hurry with those rugs-
The hot water was running over and burning her hands-
"Hurry with those rugs, Ken."
* * * * *
There were these pictures-one on each side of his bed-about eight inches square, with a flat wooden frame an inch wide.
And inside the frame-
He dropped the qiult, moved up to one picture and stood minutely examining it. What people! Peasant people, his mother had told him, probably Swiss...
Ken had never been in such a world as that.
He climed across the bed and looked at the other picture which was another peasant picture, but inside a house.
Down at the end of his room was the strangest picture of all.
Ken went to look at it. There was a verse written in the corner which he knew by heart.
Intreat me not to leave thee,
Nor to return from following after thee.
For whither thou goest I will go,
And where thou lodgest I will lodge.
"Intreat me not to leave thee," he murmered, liking something about the way the words made his voice rise and fall. Besides, there was something in this picture that the other pictures did not have, something completely grown-up and mysterious and a little exciting. "Intreat me-"
If you can't see why I love this book...well...this isn't even that half of it. Its wonderful reading. : )
