Howards End . . .

I don’t know how many times I have seen the movie “Howards End”. If it is on and I come across it in my cable wanderings, I will watch it. I don’t care if it is midway through or almost done or just beginning, my eye is drawn to the wonderful scenery and trappings of the day, to the story and its characters, the acting and the mood of it all. I want to live at Howards End.

I also want to finish the book, Howards End, by E. M. Forster. I have been wanting to read for ever-so-long and I finally opened its pages. Like most books about the turn-of-the-century, it is a slow read, rich in description and the dialogue of the day. A contrast to the fast-paced novels of this century’s turn. I need to do this every once and again. I need to pick up a book, a classic perhaps, and bite into it and hold on as I chew on the words and I embark on a really rich read.

Howards End is the name of the book and the movie, of course,  but it is also the name of the country house, an inheritance of one of the main characters, Ruth Wilcox. Ruth dies suddenly and scribbles on a piece of paper that the house is to go to her friend, Margaret Schlegel. Her family burns the paper, ignores the request, and the rest is, of course, the rest of the story.

Howard’s End is, in many ways, a study of the class systems in England during the 1900′s; the upper and middle class tiers and the tenuous one at the end of the rung, hovering between lower and middle. It actually reminds me of our life today and the struggles so many are having holding on, but, this is a digression, a habit of mine I must break.

I’ll work on finishing the book this weekend and I will encourage you pick it up sometime to read. You must see the movie as well, especially if you enjoy the time period and lush scenery and houses. The picture below is from a really fun website I think I have mentioned before called hookedonhouses and there is a wonderful post with enticing photos of Howard’s End, its countryside and its rooms.

Now, I’ll warn you of the danger of visiting this site. You will want to and will click onto the link at the end for the Schlegel sisters’ London townhome and then you will want to see other movie and television houses available, which I encourage you to do. Just don’t blame me if you spend too much time there looking at your favorite movie house.

 

Read Full Post »

Barbara’s Bookstore

Artist: Lee Lufkin Kaula americangallery.wordpress.com

Yes! It finally opened. I would drive by once a week or so on errands in the area, usually the independent grocers where I have been getting great meat and produce for great prices, only to see work being done but no open door. Finally, Monday, I decided to drive by the little outdoor shopping center and there was a sign. Barbara’s Bookstore.

Open.

Barbara’s Bookstore is an independent bookstore with several locations in the area. Their  Oak Park location has been a mainstay in that suburb, so, I was surprised to see one was coming to Burr Ridge, which isn’t very far from here. We have no real bookstores nearby and definitely no independents.

I’ve been a pleasantly surprised by Burr Ridge. I guess I expected uptown prices for my downtown wallet and tastes. There is really only one shopping location and it looks like it popped up out of the cornfields and splattered like popcorn in a very large bowl. With an older area (which is really stretching the idea of older) of a few restaurants, a grocery store that has had a few reincarnations since we have been here, a fantastic Swedish bakery, and assorted other shops and then the very new Burr Ridge Center, it has several things to offer someone like me.

Burr Ridge Center is one of those new multi-use shopping areas built to look like an old town street with shops and condos above them. With stores like Eddie Bauer, Coldwater Creek, the requisite Starbucks, etc., it is a few blocks long with heated sidewalks in the winter. A few years ago when Tom had the misfortune of falling and breaking a few ribs, I took him to the Center when he just needed to get out and walk a bit while ice covered just about every other surface around. It was a cold, brisk December night, music heralding the holiday season, and not a drop of precipitation, let alone ice, to be seen.

I wandered into to Barbara’s Bookstore on Monday,  holding my smile inside, and found a bit of paradise had come to this ol’ gal who loves to read books and touch books and smell books and listen to book pages turning. Barbara’s is arranged with nooks and crannies; art here, fiction there, a children’s section in its very own alcove and a gardening, cooking, home decorating section complete with a coffee pot that wasn’t yet perking and a kitchen counter of sorts with stools for reading.

Too bad a well healed young women was chewing so loudly I wondered if she was gnawing on bark and I feared her teeth would crack as she rustled a cellophane package, intent on a cookbook and totally oblivious to the racket she was making.  Oh well, we can’t have everything we want, can we? I purchased a copy of Howard’s End and vowed to return soon when the fireplace is crackling instead.

Read Full Post »