October 29, 2009. Harper, Texas. Reading.

This Double D Ranch is a wonderful place to read.  We have no TV or telephone and our location is remote, so no one comes to call unless invited.  This is especially true of our Top House, where the home is located at the highest hill almost a mile away from the main house.  If anyone wanted to be alone, this would be the spot.  Our neighbors Joyce and Robbie know I love to watch the World Series so they have just called us over for soup and baseball.  Aren't neighbors grand?   

This morning, Ken brought us coffee up to our room, where we read until ten o'clock before showering and dressing.  It was a great luxury.  I have just finished "Salt, A World History".  It is a fascinating book and I enjoyed it thoroughly although it is not the best written book in the world.  The author, Mark Kurlansky, is a journalist, and I think perhaps each chapter was written for some other journal, then pulled together for the book  so the information is chopped up all over the world and lacks organization.  But I now have hundreds of facts about salt, which I will remember for three weeks.  

Now I am in the middle of "Miles Gone By", a literary autobiography written by William F. Buckley.  It is a fascinating read and I am enjoying the book.  Even if you disagree with his point of view, he writes beautifully and had a charmed life.  I believe that he spent a lifetime fending off being bored.   Not so long ago I read the book by the younger brother, Reid Buckley, a biography of the Father and Mother, so I am interested in the Buckley Family.  Priscilla Buckley has just published a book on her travels, she an older sister who was the Managing Editor of The National Review for many years.  Also son Christopher has just published a book about life with Mother and Father.  I am grateful for this time to read, here in the Hill Country of Texas.