Now, What In The World Does Allen Drury Have To Do With Yom Kippur????????????????

                                       For those of my girls out there recognizing this Day Of Atonement, I wish you an easy fast!!!!!!!!!!!!!   Meanwhile, as I was telling Monsieur, who is at services, while I, the non-Jew, sits home and writes, whenever this day comes up, Allen Drury always pops into my mind.

                                        That is because back in the day, when I was in high school, I had this acquaintance, Alan Turniansky, who was a mathematical genius.  He was a year behind me, and I cannot believe how dumb I was not to take advantage of Alan's mathematical acumen, so I might have realized the math potential I knew I had, but which faulty teaching could not bring out.  On those tests, like the SATS, while I always scored exceedingly high on the verbal--are you surprised, darlings????????--my math scores were always better than my day to day performance warranted.  Clearly, I had the potential; I even had a bit of interest, but nothing was ever done about it!

                                          But back to Alan.  He had, in his attic, an enormous collection of DC super-hero comics--the ones from the Sixties era, which now would be worth something--but  back then, I loved reading for the stories, color and art.  I recall, they were kept on shelves in his attic, and were alphabetized, and arranged as carefully as a library archive!  I often wonder if Alan, who, I believe now lives in Florida, and does some mathematically related work, still has these comics, or what ever happened to them?????

                                           One thing he used to tell me was that, on each Yom Kippur, during this period of his life, he would stay in his room all day, and read an entire Allen Drury novel.  This fascinated me; why Allen Drury, for starters?  And was it the same novel each year, or a different one?  And how long did this go on?  And when did it stop????????????

                                              I will probably never know.  Just like I will never know how he got access to so many Drury novels!!!!!!!!!  Did his family have a collection in their house?  Did he take them out of the library, each year, around this time????????????????

                                                I recall we had one of Drury;'s books in my house, growing up, but I cannot  recall which one, nor did I read it.  I never read any, until "Advise And Consent" a few years ago.  If any of Drury's books are still in print, this would have to be the one.  It was h is most celebrated, he won the Pulitzer Prize for it, and it was made into an A-list Hollywood movie!  The rest of his canon seems to have vanished, unless holed up in a university archive somewhere.

                                                   So, here we another, another Yom Kippur, and thoughts of Allen
Drury.  While my partner is at services, I am going to do some reading too--something more prosaic than Drury, and something I have not read since it first came out, 35 years ago.

                                                     That would be "The Thorn Birds" by Colleen McCullough!!!!!!!!!!
I don't know if I will get through it in a single day, but when I do, I will share it with you, on here!

                                                       Meanwhile,a blessed Yom Kippur, to those who partake!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!