My parents treated books, all books, with great reverence. We were to TAKE NOTES, not underline an important thought in a book. We were to USE BOOKMARKS, not turn a book upside down or--HORRORS--dog-ear pages to mark the place where we left off reading.

So it is with some trepidation that, these days, I dog-ear book pages. I do it not to mark my place (I own dozens of bookmarks and enjoy using them) but in lieu of note-taking. Or to mark something I will write down in the future, when I get around to taking those notes. (I usually do get around to taking notes because then I need notebooks. NOTEBOOKS! and PENS!)

In any case, here's a quote from a page I dog-eared recently.

Which may finally be the only real difference between one place on the earth and another: how you think about the people, and the difference it makes to you to think that way.                                                                     --Canada, Richard Ford

Earlier in that paragraph, the narrator quotes a different character as saying, "Canada had everything America ever had, but no one was mad about it."

I'm not sure I 100% agree with either quote, but both are interesting to ponder, in these times when it feels as if political news is impossible to escape. Sigh.