A holiday gift

By Evelyn C. McDonald
Arts & Culture Reporter
December 11, 2019

I was looking at an album of photos and came across one photo of my granddaughter on her mother’s lap. She’s clutching a book with a look of absolute pleasure on her face. At that time, she was at the picture book stage. I thought of her earlier this week when I stopped by Story & Song to buy books in their holiday book donations program.

I like to finding unique ways to donate. I am attracted to the Story & Song program that aims to put books in the hands of children and young adults. It’s a doubly appealing program to me because I love books and strongly believe they are invaluable gifts.

Mark and Donna Kaufman have done this program for a couple of years now. They select books that will appeal to all ages of children and young adults. You can pick any age group you fancy and select from a series of books suitable for that group. This year I asked Donna to choose two books for me. She did that but also explained why she felt those particular books would be appealing.

In this age of digital everything, many people argue that physical books are irrelevant. No one is reading in paper anymore is the sentiment you’ll hear. Let me suggest that the success of the Friends of the Library book sale proves that is a short-sighted view. I can remember being a cashier at the book sales and seeing parents come up with armloads of books and smiling children who had helped select them.

A book you give a child is not only a story that can entertain them. It is something uniquely theirs. They can hold it in their hands, read it in bed when they are supposed to be asleep, and set it on a shelf in their room.

Story & Song makes a modest effort to put books in the hands of the young. They have 166 books that they are asking us to buy to distribute to Nassau County children in need. Books range in price but none are much more than the cost of a dinner out. This is an effort that is easy to support. Come by the store before December 18 and have the staff show you the books. Pick out a book or books or give the staff the amount you’d like to spend and they will select books for you.
Next to the photo of my granddaughter with her book, I had written a quote from Emily Dickinson. Let me end with this thought:

“There is no frigate like a book/To take us lands away.”

Happy Holidays

Evelyn McDonald moved to Fernandina Beach from the Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C. in 2006. Evelyn is vice-chair on the Amelia Center for Lifelong Learning and is on the Dean’s Council for the Carpenter Library at the UNF. Ms. McDonald has MS in Technology Management from the University of Maryland’s University College and a BA in Spanish from the University of Michigan.