“Only you,” my husband said, “would trade a shoe for a book.”
“What’s worth more?” I asked, “Maimonides, or some old shoe?”
I knew that I had the better of the argument, and my husband would understand. After all, our first date had been a trip to a bookstore. But he just shrugged and sighed. Where had my book-loving husband gone?
“You’ve changed,” I said.
“It’s not that you have a book instead of a shoe,” he said, “It’s that you never remember making the trade. You’ve changed.”
It’s true that I sometimes head to the kitchen hoping to get a chocolate éclair from the freezer and return holding a small frog. I don’t know how the frog got into the kitchen. I just know that it’s something new, and interesting enough to make me forget the chocolate éclair. My husband should be glad that I can be distracted by a frog in the kitchen. Certainly, my waistline thanks me.
And I still have my wits about me. To prove it, when we returned home, I sat on the couch, opened Guide for the Perplexed, and started to read. I was, after all, perplexed, and could use a guide.
Author's Comment
I woke from dreaming of the images in the first sentence of this story, and knew I had to elaborate – but just a little bit.
A Mother and Daughter Turn Tragedy into Peace
The true story of a damaged primal bond between mother and daughter that, after decades of estrangement, was finally repaired.
The conflict began when Carla was a preteen, destroying the warm love she and her mother had once had for each other and beginning an “ice age” between them.
Forty years later, determined that this mother/daughter relationship not end as tragedy, Carla used every tool available to her—psychology, diplomacy, humanity, wit, patience—to repair their bond. Finally, over her mother’s kitchen table, they melted the ice, finding their way back to laughter and closeness.
This loving, grounded memoir shows that rebuilding a primal bond is doable—and will prompt readers to ask themselves, Could I do the same? What if I reached out, today?
Carla lost her long battle with cancer shortly after finishing the book; she lived just long enough to do the first edit and approve the cover design.
Available from Bookshop, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and your local independent bookstore.
Lynn Gazis grew up in the suburbs of New York City, spent her young adulthood in the San Francisco Bay Area, and now lives in Southern California. She has worked for around 40 years in IT. More recently, she has started writing short fiction. Her stories have been published by Cathedral Canyon Review, Air and Nothingness Press, and Friends Journal. 
As an artist, musician and poet, Donna Bauman says, “my life has been all about being a seeker, asking questions, exploring, creating. As a creator of beauty, I feel inspired to radiate as much of the feminine spirit as possible. I am here to bring inspiration into form. My desire is that my creations will enter into people’s lives in an inspiring and transforming way.”