Cornfields

Little House on the Prairie? 

Not exactly. Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink.

 Blond hair, blue eyes, pink sundress. A 10 year old figure, curled up on the back porch of her parents' red brick house, immersed in the pages of the time-worn novel she found lying forgotten under the coach... 

Caddie Woodlawn, with her fiery red hair, green eyes, and blue sundress, jumped out from the pages and snatched my hand with an eager, earnest, adventurous energy I found impossible to resist. The 11 year old tomboy from Wisconsin dragged me into her world of river wading, chicken stealing, and Indian romping. Many an afternoon while the sunlight snuck through the trees in my own backyard, my parents would find me frolicking through the cornfields with Caddie and her brothers, chasing rabbits, and sometimes being chased ourselves. Every chapter provided another adventure, friends to lose and gain, and new relatives to hassle and terrorize with innocent childlike pranks. I mocked at Caddie's simpering, refined older sister, snickered at her proper, pristine mother when she would sigh and shake her head at Caddie's monstrously unladylike behavior, from stripping off her clothes to go wading through a river to beating up a boy at her school for pulling her flaming red hair.

She is certainly an endearing character, and as a young girl myself, reading about her adventures greatly influenced my growth and how I judged good entertainment in my life. (I'm pretty sure my love for muddy weather and climbing trees in the rain stems from Caddie's own interests).

Yes, it is a children's book. But it is also a window into a past, my past or your past.

To see again with the eyes of a child is one of the most beautiful contributions the written word has to offer. That's my opinion. Some may view it as a waste of time, but it's how I waste mine.

Caddie Woodlawn, by Carol Ryrie Brink...it taught me to run with another's feet.

""No two persons ever read the same book." - Edmund Wilson