Literary Miracle

Of a sort. Some background facts, pertinent to my story:

1. As a child, I read a lot. To say I was a voracious reader would be something of an understatement. I took a book with me pretty much everywhere we went.

2. My paternal grandparents had a farm just outside Fort Langley. After my grandmother died, my grandfather remarried, in 1976. His new wife didn't like our family all that much and, as a result, we didn't get that many invitations. We did, however, spend Boxing Day there every year - a tense and painful gathering.

3. They sold the farm in 1988 or '89.

And now, on to the story ...

About 2 years ago, Chickadee and her dad were browsing in an antique/used bookstore in Fort Langley. She knew I had read a lot of Nancy Drew books when I was young and, spotting 6 or 8' of the yellow books on a shelf, asked if she could get one. When he dropped her off an my place a few hours later, she proudly showed me the book she had chosen:



It looked vaguely familiar and I said I thought I had read this one as a kid. Chickadee hadn't opened the book yet, and I flipped the cover open to look for the standard plot synopsis. Instead, I saw the following inscription on the fly leaf:



The handwriting is that of my maternal grandmother, who died 6 months before Chickadee was born, the date my tenth birthday. I had, in fact, read that book.

I promptly called my mother and (politely) accused her of selling off my childhood library. She said no, that all my books were in boxes in their garage. So the only explanation I can think of is that I received the book on December 15th, and took it with me to the farm on Boxing Day. I must have finished it there, and left it behind. Then, some 12 or 13 years later, when the farm was sold, my evil step-grandmother must have sold all their books to a local dealer. And there Nancy sat until 2003, when my daughter found her and brought her back to me.