That red book about the little boy.

I don't remember reading a lot of books when I was younger. I remember classics like Bears on Wheels by The Berenstains Amelia Bedelia by Peggy Parish, and The Shape of Me and other Things by Dr. Seuss.

And then I have these odd, half memories of books that I know I heard, but can't remember anything but a glimmer. For this reason, I completely understand when people come into the library with a hopeful look in their eye and say, "I read a book when I was younger . . . it was red. It was about a little boy, I think?" And then they look at me as if I just put that exact book back on the shelf and can run and get it for them.

This week, I was shelving books and I found something familiar and frightening. Not only had I remembered parts of this book,

Little Rabbit's Loose Tooth by Lucy Bate

In my odd little mind, I had gotten Little Rabbit's story all mixed up with Julian's Stories from,

The Stories Julian Tells by Ann Cameron

I hadn't seen Little Rabbit since grade school, but I remember how she tried to loose her tooth in all kinds of foods, and then finally it falls out in her pudding.

Julian, I searched for and rediscovered a few years ago because I couldn't get the story of "Catalog Cats" out of my head. Julian also has a story about pudding, and a separate one about loosing a tooth. But in Julian's story, his dad tries to tie his tooth to a door handle with a string. NOT the same as I remember.

Isn't memory a funny thing.

I've been reading Sounder by William H. Armstrong for months now. The book has 105 pages and shouldn't be taking me this long, but I'm stuck. I have this memory of my 5th grade class cracking walnuts on the playground black top, trying to get them out of the shell whole because of a book my teacher read us. After reading the first chapters, I realize that she read our class Sounder. I always wondered what book that was . . . mystery solved.