Ratty, Mole and Mr. Badger

I just finished The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame for the umpteenth time.  Now that I live by a river bordering the wild woods, the book mirrored my own observations.   Grahame's descriptions of the water, the forest and the seasons are so beautiful that it made me put the book down several times to look out at the Columbia and the landscape of trees on the other side.  "Yes," I found myself saying.  "Yes.  Yes.  Yes."

The River

The Mole, upon seeing a river for the very first time is utterly amazed.  He asks the Rat, "And you really live by the river?  What a jolly life!"

"By it and with it and on it and in it," said the Rat. . . ."It's my world, and I don't want any other."

 

The Wild Woods

There was nothing to alarm him at first entry.  Twigs crackled under his feet, logs tripped him, funguses on stumps resembled caricatures, and startled him for the moment by their likeness to something familiar and far away; but that was all fun, and exciting.  It led him on, and he penetrated to where the light was less, and trees crouched nearer and nearer, and holes made ugly mouths at him on either side.

I am living within the pages of  this book.  Besides Ratty, Mole and Mr. Badger, I have made other friends.  They are Bald Eagle, Mule Deer and Blue Heron.  The title of the book is slightly different, as well.  I have renamed it The Wind in the Gorge.