COLUMN: Giant Jam Sandwich

While there are certainly nights I can hop right in bed and fall asleep there are also those nights where I toss and turn for hours. It often times has to do with some stress for work but other times it is for a really mundane or strange reason and this was the case last week when at 2 a.m. I was thinking of a giant sandwich.

The night had started off pretty good as I wondered to go to bed at 9 p.m. That may sound a bit early for some but not for me. I don't mind going to bed early and in fact, I kind of enjoy it. Around midnight I was rattled out of a deep sleep by a semi going way to fast down the highway that runs by the house and I could not get back to sleep. I tossed and turned for what seemed like eternity and right as I was about to fall asleep a sudden thought crept into my head.

For some reason, I started thinking of the line "One hot summer in Itching Down", and for the life of me, I had no idea what it was about. It sounded so familiar, but I couldn't figure it out and it kept racing through my head. That is a really bizarre thing to randomly think of in the middle of the night and I was stumped where it came from or if I was just making it up in some sort of half-awake/half-asleep state.

After about an hour of trying to figure out what this was from, I decided to grab my phone. I was thinking it would have to be a line from a movie or a song, so I did a Google search for it.

As soon as I saw the results, I remembered right away why this line meant something to me.

"One hot summer in Itching Down" is the opening line in the children's book "The Giant Jam Sandwich" by John Vernon Lord. I'm not completely sure who purchased the book for me or if I may have bought it myself on a trip to the bookstore, but this book was my absolute favorite as a kid. I must have read it 1,000 times and it never got old.

Those unfamiliar with the book, it is about a town that has a horrible wasp problem and their ingenious way to remedy the issue is to make a giant jam sandwich. The prose of the book was very clever, and the pictures were just as great.

No matter how many times I would purge my collection of books I could never get rid of this one and one day when I was feeling nostalgic in college, I was going through items from grade school and found my copy of the book. I was so elated I decided to work the book into my storytelling course and memorized the entire text and presented it. It went very well and was a tremendous way to bring new life into a book that used to mean so much to me.

Unfortunately, the book was in a big green trunk that was stolen from a storage unit from Wyoming. There was a lot in that trunk that meant the world to me and the book was high on the list.

As the years passed, and without a copy, I guess I stored the book in a far corner of my memory, perhaps to never be thought of again.

Well, that certainly was not the case and when it slowly started to creep into my subconscious it happened to be in the middle of the night.

As soon as I wrap up writing this column, I am seriously considering getting online and purchasing the book. If I do so I want to find the same style that I had. Of course, it won't be my exact book, but having it the same press run and style would be magnificent.

I can't wait to read it again, and this time I hope I won't forget about it.

I'm a little bit scared of what may sneak into my mind the next time I can't sleep, but if it is something similar to "One hot summer in Itching Down", I will be completely happy, although I many need an extra cup of coffee the next day.