by Janis Patterson
I’ll admit it – I loved Nancy Drew.
Didn’t like Trixie Belden, couldn’t stand the other one whose name I can’t
remember right now, was never allowed to read Cherry Ames (she was a nurse, and
my mother hated that) but I simply loved Nancy Drew. Our own Kathleen Kaska
recently blogged on Nancy Drew, which brought up a plethora of memories I thought
amusing enough to share with you.
I learned to read early – around
three, we think, but no one knows for sure – and by five was gleefully working
my way through my parents’ library before they really knew what I was reading,
not that in those antique days there was anything ‘risque’ in there. I had
gotten about half-way through their small collection of Ellery Queens, which I
pretty much understood, and some history books which I pretty much didn’t. I
remember especially remember Boswell’s London Journal, mainly for how much it
horrified my parents to find me reading it.
Anyway, in their search to find more
age-appropriate reading matter for me, Mother took me to the local library
where a kindly librarian took us to the children’s department. I was allowed to
pick out six books, and I remember being very distressed at how thin they were.
Mother was very distressed that I had them all read before we could drive home.
After several equally unproductive visits, we went over to the grown-up section
(‘adult’ has such an unfortunate connotation these days) and I found several
books I would like to read. The kindly librarian suddenly turned into a
martinet; children, she said in pointy tones, could not check out books from
the adult section because they would only tear them up and they couldn’t really
read them anyway. When I realized I was being insulted I reacted with a spirited
rebuttal, which resulted in the librarian regarding me much as she would a
talking dog or other freak of nature. I was summarily ejected from the library and
banished for a week. Although I now do speaking engagements at libraries I have
looked at them askance ever since.
Then salvation came in the unlikely
form of Sears and Roebuck. In my youth that was our main shopping outlet. On
Thursday nights, when they stayed open until the dizzying hour of 9 pm, we
would go after supper just for the fun of riding the new escalators. Those were indeed
simpler times. Anyway, one night we walked past a sale display of Nancy Drew
books. They looked fascinating and while Mother’s and Daddy's attention was occupied
elsewhere, I inspected them and lost my heart. At 99 cents each they were still
a fair amount, for our family at least, but the memory of my humiliation in the
library was still fresh, so somehow my parents scraped up the required amount and I was the
proud possessor of my first Nancy Drew. I don’t remember which one it was, but
I do know I still own it – I still have every one I ever owned. Whichever one it was, I must
have read it fifteen or twenty times in the next week. After that, even though
we were very far from well-to-do, once a month I got a new Nancy Drew, even
after the price went back to the regular $1.99 – a goodly sum in those days.
I would have gone back to the
library and even apologized to the librarian for being so abnormal as to be able
to read adult books if I could have checked out Nancy Drews. Unfortunately in
those days libraries did not find Nancy and her friends ‘worthwhile’ reading
and refused to stock them. More fool them.
Anyway, I was ecstatically happy no
matter where the books came from. A mystery I could actually understand! A girl
sleuth I could identify with! Of course, to my young mind there was no
difference between a fictional, perfect teenager and my own much younger and
rather lumpy self, but that made no difference. When I was reading, I was
Nancy. Nancy drove a car (though I had to look up what a roadster was), she had
seemingly unlimited funds, she was allowed to go where and when she wanted, all
the while delicious mysteries seemed to leap into her path.
Now from the vantage point of my
unfortunately advanced years, I realize no one could possibly be as perfect in
mind, body, family, and life in general as Nancy Drew. Also that Carson Drew
was the most lax of parents, perhaps even to the criminal point, but to my
young self, as the product of two ridiculously overprotective parents, that was
a situation to be envied.
As I grew a little older (though
still in lower elementary school) I entered a very analytical phase and decided
that just with a little application I could be just the same as Nancy. Of
course, I had no money, no car, and two very hover-prone parents, but if I
could just find a mystery to solve I was certain I could overcome those
hurdles. I thought if I re-read every Nancy Drew I had and made a chart of how she
got involved with each mystery, I could do the same thing and have a mystery of
my own – only thing was, I found the mysteries all seemed to come to Nancy with no effort on her
part. Drat!
The years have passed and my tastes
have (hopefully!) become much more sophisticated. It’s been a couple of decades
since I read a Nancy Drew, and perhaps that’s good. The province of our memory
is often kinder than present perception, and I treasure my memories of Nancy
Drew too much to put them at risk.
