I start most of my days with a phone call to my mom. I never take for granted that many of my friends have lost their moms, and I am grateful every day when she picks up the phone, singing her “hello”. On this particular day, I knew the answer to my question, “What are you doing today?” Monday was sheets day. Just like the mailman that delivers the mail in rain, snow, sleet, and hail, the sheets get washed on Mondays regardless of illness, season, or mood. But more importantly, it was a beautiful day so she added, “I’m airing out my pillows.” For those of you who have never done this, it requires you to take your bed pillows and lay them outside, particularly in the sun, for a few hours. Just the idea of watching her gather the pillows overflowing in her arms and putting them out brings a huge smile to my face.
As I have aged, I have begun to recognize that there are reasons other than a crisp, clean scent to throw those pillows outside on a warm day.
They are our secret keepers as we tell our deepest fears and desires during “pillow talk” with a loved one. Whispering in the dark room into your pillow is the same as locking these thoughts away in a vault. The pillow also puts your head in the exact position to face a loved one and stare into their eyes. When life gets hard, we can count on your pillow, our stalwart friend, to catch our tears when we quietly express our pain. We know that our trusted pillow, just like a trusted friend, will never betray us.
​So on the first sunshiny day, I grabbed all the pillows in my arms and arranged them on the deck furniture. They seemed a bit unrulily to carry and a little heavier than I expected. I checked on them throughout the afternoon as I would a visiting friend. And each glance outside found them exactly where I left them. But maybe they were different. 

I was an English major in college, and I thought I was so cool. While my friends were solving differential equations or learning international policies, I was relishing the words of the great British poets. I saw their words as my academic conundrum. What did they mean? What did they think when they wrote this or that? These men were my people. I spent many nights curled up with a book of poetry and found myself lost in words. I could read a poem that, for some, appeared to be in Greek (old English) and tell you precisely what the words meant.
   
    I was particularly fond of Shakespeare and loved seeing and hearing the jokes (he was very comical) and watching his characters develop and float in the beauty of his sonnets. But I did not learn in college that the proper understanding of poetry happens when you are ready for it. In college, I was not.
    Yes, I could quote the good stuff, but looking back now, It was my party trick to quote a sonnet and watch as my friends nodded in approval. Could my accountant friends do that?
 
I was living and breathing the masters, but I was faking my understanding and the emotional connection to the words. I looked at the terms and mechanically assigned meaning to them. If the birds were soaring, I could visualize birds taking flight. I thought I understood what the masters were trying to convey. 

I read the Greats, but I never really "read" them.  That's right; I was using my mechanical mind to listen. Youth is definitely wasted on the young.
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I want to go back and do it all other again. How would it feel to be Jonah in the whale? Was Mr. Darcy a real cad? What loneliness must Heathcliff have experienced brought to a new country? What the heck does that sonnet mean?
What would you want to read again with the benfit of maturity?