#MicroblogMondays: Escape through books

I don't often get "triggered" these days -- but the photo in this link -- a newsletter/article from the books editor of the Washington Post -- had me in tears and reaching for kleenex. 

(Rest assured, it's nothing graphic or gory.) It's the photo of a little girl, bundled up in winter clothes, sitting on a suitcase at the train station in Warsaw, leaning against her mother, who is masked and reading to her from a children's book. 

They are Ukrainian refugees who had just arrived in Poland from Kyiv. 

It grabbed me for so many reasons. As a bereaved mother who never got to read books to her only little girl (except briefly in utero) or to have that little girl snuggle up to me as I read to her. As someone who loved books as a child, and who still loves them today, who can't imagine a life without books, or a child without access to books, or having to leave ALL my precious books behind and flee from my home. As someone whose ancestry is half Ukrainian. As someone who's been dealing with this global pandemic for two years and who (like the mother in the photo) is still wearing a mask, even as the mandates are being lifted. As someone who grew up on the Canadian Prairies, playing outside for hours in the winter snow and cold, bundled up much like the little girl in the photo.  

"In such horrific conditions, periods of imaginative escape are essential for children — and books are the perfect vehicle," the article says. 

There's a link within the article to a Polish organization that is buying and distributing Ukrainian-language books for Ukrainian refugee children. Doing so will also help to support the Ukrainian publishing industry through these difficult days. 

I made a donation. How could I not? 

You can find more of this week's #MicroblogMondays posts here.