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After a lifetime of books, retired teacher and avid reader decides to write her own Date published: 9/25/2009
By CATHY DYSON Virginia Acors has been in love with the written word from the time she was old enough to hold a book. She's always read everything she could get her hands on, and she practically lived in the library from elementary school through college. She became a teacher, then a reading specialist. She helped students at Lee Hill Elementary School put their thoughts onto pages of blank books. After Virginia retired from Spotsylvania County schools in 2004, she found that reading three or four books at a time didn't quench her thirst for language. She needed to write her own. "I couldn't get enough just reading," the 59-year-0ld said. "I wanted to tell the stories in this head of mine." Virginia keeps pads of paper by her bed, next to her recliner, on the kitchen table, in her purse and in her bag of crocheting supplies. That way, she can jot down ideas that pop into her head. She'll be talking to her husband, Vernon, about a memory from when she was a substitute teacher and say, "Hmm, that would make a good story." The two have been married for 38 years and live on "Acors Acres" in Partlow. He grew up not far from the home they built--two of their three sons live nearby--and she was raised in Chancellorsville, near the battlefield park. The couple paid to publish Virginia's first book of memoirs. Called "Thoughts of a Country Girl," the paperback is filled with accounts of what she calls simpler times. She describes trips to the outhouse and riding her bike over miles of country roads. She recalls her father's tractor, her grandmother's quilt and the time her little sister thought a 9-foot black snake in the basement was a rubber toy to play with. Some of the stories are fictional, and others are based on family events. All have a grain of truth and reflect the joy of growing up in the area when Fredericksburg was a quieter and gentler place. Virginia and Vernon smile when they talk about what an event it was to go to town. They recall when Sears and "Monkey Wards," the nickname for the Montgomery Ward store, were in downtown Fredericksburg.
Date published: 9/25/2009
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