Like nearly every other child of my generation and the ones before it, I grew up imitating a freckled girl with hair the color of carrots and a fiery temper. I pitied anyone who didn't have a good imagination, named every flower I came across and searched everywhere for a kindred spirit. But sometimes, I am too much like that little red-headed girl.
Anne of Green Gables taught me a great many lessons for which I am eternally grateful, but she also trained me to have some bad habits (one of which may or may not have been the longing to walk along the top of a roof). So, in honor of Anne's influence on my life, here are a few habits and tips I learned from her – both good and bad.
1. “Kindred spirits are not so scarce as I used to think. It's splendid to find out there are so many of them in the world.”
I don't think I will ever stop thinking of my friends as kindred spirits. And I am beginning to agree with Anne: they are not so scarce as I used to think. It is splendid to find out there are so many of them.
2. “My life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes.”
I will willingly admit that my overly-dramatic outlook on life is entirely to be blamed on Anne Shirley. When anything goes wrong, like Anne, I tend to believe that the world necessarily becomes a world of darkened dreams and buried hopes.
3. “People laugh at me because I use big words. But if you have big ideas, you have to use big words to express them, haven't you?”
Maybe this is why I read part of a dictionary for fun when I was younger. Perhaps I also get a little too much pleasure from having a rather large and perspicacious vocabulary.
4. “Look at that sea, girls – all silver and shadow and vision of things not seen. We couldn't enjoy its loveliness any more if we had millions of dollars and ropes of diamonds."
There isn't much to add to this. All I can say is that Anne has taught me to love beauty in the world more than money and I am grateful to her for that.
5. “Why must people kneel down to pray?"
She goes on to say that "If I really wanted to pray I’ll tell you what I'd do. I'd go out into a great big field all alone or in the deep, deep woods and I'd look up into the sky—up—up—up—into that lovely blue sky that looks as if there was no end to its blueness. And then I'd just feel a prayer." Yes, this gave me a very romantic approach to my spiritual life but perhaps made me less than excited to go to church every Sunday. After all, if I really wanted to pray, a field of buttercups and a lovely blue sky would be far more appropriate.
6. “Red hair is my life long sorrow.”
Anne made me realize that I am not the only one regrets and bemoans her own physical appearance. I wanted to have red hair my whole life and she wanted to have brown. She taught me that dying your hair green is not the solution to discontentment and vanity.
7. “I'm not a bit changed – not really. I'm only just pruned down and branched out. The real ME – back here – is just the same.”
This particular quote seems even more appropriate upon coming back home from college. I was told I would feel very different and home would be strange. I do feel different but home is just that same and, like Anne, I'm not a bit changed – not really. I'm only just pruned down and branched out.
8. “The world looks like something God had just imagined for his own pleasure, doesn't it?”
Anne made me see the world through her eyes and showed me that the world is really a very spectacular place filled with beautiful surprises. Maybe I'm too romantic and sentimental about it all... but so was Anne, so I don't think I'm too far off.
9. "Which would you rather be if you had the choice – divinely beautiful or dazzlingly clever or angelically good?"
I suppose this is simply a question which has rattled around in my head ever since I first heard it. Of course, I would love to be all three, but if I had to pick, which would I choose?
10. "God's in His heaven, all's right with the world."
Dear old Anne of Green Gables has no better words with which to close – ones of gratefulness and awe. A gratefulness and awe with which she approached everything in life including God.
