Skinny Dip with Candice Ransom

9_23SkinnyRebelDo you like to gift wrap presents?

Yes! I’ll buy the gift wrap before I buy the present! Years ago when I was a teenager, Hallmark started carrying their products in Dart Drug. I lathered over the Hallmark section, spending my allowance on Peanuts cards and gift tags and wrapping paper, yarn and fancy bows. My sister once said that I always spent more on the wrapping than the actual gift.

Even now I buy beau­ti­ful paper in muse­um gift shops. In April I took a trip to New York. I bought so many paper goods I had to buy an extra suit­case. My favorites? Sheets of Cav­alli­ni gift wrap from the Amer­i­can Muse­um of Nat­ur­al His­to­ry. I car­ried the rolled tube on the train like the Holy Grail.

What’s the first book report you ever wrote?

I don’t remember the very first book report, but I do remember writing a wonderful book review of The Yearling for eighth grade English. And then, the teacher lowered the boom. Instead of turning them in, we had to give them orally. I froze. At that time, I was so shy I couldn’t even answer the phone. Only a certain number of students read each day. Each day I waited in terror for my name to be called. On the fourth day, it was. I could not—simply could not—get up in front of the class. So I lied and told my teacher I hadn’t done my report, even though it was in my notebook, beautifully written, and I took a zero.

What book do you tell everyone to read? 

9_23DiamondWhen I was eleven, the most wonderful book ever fell into my hands, A Diamond in the Window, by Jane Langton. Even now, I chase everyone down and beg them to read this fantasy-mystery-historical-family story liberally sprinkled with Thoreau, Emerson, and Louisa May Alcott. It changed my life. I had to be married on Valentine’s Day because of a chapter in the book (try explaining that to your husband-to-be during the Blizzard of ’79—three feet of snow on the ground, but we made it).

Ten years ago I met Jane Lang­ton and told her how much her book meant to me. I was so eager, so, I don’t know, hero-wor­ship­ful that I was not ready when she said in her kind voice, “Oh, every year peo­ple tell me the exact same thing.” The breath left my body. No! Her book only changed my life!

Well, I still tell every­one to read it, if they can get hold of a copy. It might change their life, but not the way it changed mine.

Describe your most favorite pair of pajamas ever. 

I was five and we had just moved into a house in the country (read: sticks). I had my own bedroom for the first time, and my own bed (until then, I lived in someone else’s house and slept in a crib—that’s why I’m so short). My mother bought—or made, she sewed all of our clothes—a pair of Donald Duck pajamas. The print was turquoise and yellow. I loved those pajamas beyond all reason. When I finally outgrew them, my mother tucked them in her bottom dresser drawer with her sewing supplies.

When I was in my twen­ties and on my own, my moth­er made me a twin-size quilt. Not a fan­cy quilt­ed quilt, just a nine-patch tied off. She’d used fab­ric from some of clothes she’d made me. There in the cen­ter is a piece of the Don­ald Duck paja­mas. I still have the quilt. I love it beyond all reason.

What do you wish you could tell your ten-year-old self? 

9_23FitnessOh, my. She was such a brave, funny girl. Shy and yet adventurous. Smart but she failed math and the President’s Physical Fitness tests (she was proud of walking the 600, earning the slowest time in the history of field day—over 13 minutes). She wanted so many things, that girl. She wanted to be a writer and a detective and maybe a vet and, secretly, a ballerina even though she was stiffer than barn wood and had never had a dance class in her life. She also wanted to be an artist and she believed she could do all of those things!

Part of me wants to warn her of what’s com­ing, but a big­ger part of me wants her to stay in the dark, let her be her­self as long as pos­si­ble. I wouldn’t tell her that she won’t be able to do all the things she want­ed: the sight of blood makes her faint, she can’t stay up long enough to be a detec­tive (all those night stake-outs), and, sad­dest of all, that she won’t be able to go to art school. Or any school, real­ly, until she’s 50. No, I won’t tell her that.

I think I would tell her to remem­ber bet­ter where she lived, every lit­tle bit of it. The trees, the gar­den, the straw­ber­ry patch in June, the mar­tin house she asked her step­fa­ther to build but stayed emp­ty, the blue can­dle lights in the pic­ture win­dow at Christ­mas, the can­ning-jar smell of the base­ment, the rumbly sound of Half-Pint purring, the taste of fried squash washed down with sweet iced tea on a hot July evening, the feel of the brush as Mama worked the tan­gles from my hair.

Yes, that’s what I’d tell her. Remem­ber bet­ter, girl, because your six­ty-three-year old self will have trou­ble. And she needs the gifts of those mem­o­ries to get through the day. They don’t even have to be wrapped in fan­cy paper.

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David LaRochelle
8 years ago

What a great inter­view, Can­dice! Thank you! I can feel that poor girl’s shy­ness, who would rather take a zero than speak in front of the class!