John James Audubon's Birds of America
Old Memory Revisited! Read this two-line story.
Wait! I wrote it up. It's longer now. Under the pictures is the story from THE GRASS ON THE HILL GROWS GREEN

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Birds of America with Dad's Signature and 1939 Date b.jpg



Dad and I were looking through this famous book in about 1958.
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When we got to the wood thrush, I turned the page and ripped it by mistake. I looked at my dad afraid he'd be mad.
He said, "That's all right. I like you more than the book!"


It also damaged the page to the indigo bunting.
PS: That Scotch tape really turned out to be a wise choice for the repair. You can see how nicely it's stood the test of time.
6. Recuerdo de Audubon

Le dije a mi padre unos cuantos años antes de su muerte:
—¿Sabes una cosa? Se me acaba de ocurrir algo que pasó hace más de cuarenta años. Tú y yo estábamos en el sofá en la casa en la Calle Sierra Vista repasando tu libro de John James Audubon, Pájaros de América. Yo doblé una página. Siendo joven y descuidado, al hacerlo la rasgué. Te miré preocupado porque creía que te ibas a enfadar ya que era un libro predilecto tuyo que habías tenido por mucho tiempo. ¿Sabes lo que me dijiste?
—No  —contestó—. Dime.
—Me dijiste, "Está bien. Me gustas más que el libro."
—¡Oh! Qué bueno —respondió felizmente—. ¡Hice algo bueno!
En noviembre de 2016 yo estaba en nuestra casa en Flagstaff preparándola para el invierno cuando de nuevo me vino a la memoria lo que había pasado hace tantos años. Entonces fue cuando me di cuenta de que el libro de Audubon estaba en un estante de la biblioteca familiar. Lo encontré y al abrirlo pronto vi la página rasgada.
Aparentemente habíamos estado mirando un tordo, el zorzal maculado cuando rasgué la página. Yo dañé, desde luego, la siguiente página también. Era la página del azulejo índigo.
Ví que mi padre había escrito su nombre Gerald A. Cole con el año 1939 en la portada interior. Ya que nació el 25 de diciembre de 1917 él debía de tener solamente 21 años cuando consiguió el libro.



6. Audubon Memory

I told my father a few years before his passing, "You know what? I've just remembered something that happened better than forty years ago. You and I were on the sofa in the Sierra Vista house looking through your John James Audubon, Birds of America book. I turned a page, and being young and careless I ripped it. I looked at you worried that you'd be mad because it was a favorite book of yours that you'd had for a long time. Do you know what you said?"
"No," he answered. "Tell me."
"You said, 'That's all right. I like you better than the book.'"
"Oh, that's nice," he responded happily. "I did something good!"
In November of 2016 I was in our house in Flagstaff preparing it for the winter when once again I thought of what had happened so many years before. It was then that I realized that the Audubon book was on a shelf in the family library. I got it and quickly found the torn page.
Apparently we had been looking at the wood thrush when I tore it. I damaged the next page as well, of course. It was the indigo bunting page.
I saw that my father had written his name, Gerald A. Cole with the year 1939 on the title page. Since he was born on December 25, 1917, he must have been just twenty-one when he got the book.