At four years old, Eleanor was hit by a car. It was 1937: she remembers the sunshine in her hospital room, the doctor, the nurses, the glass straw in her cup of water. She remembers that her face had been disfigured, leaving her ridiculed for years. But those experiences prepared her for the future - first with apprehension and suspicion, then with acceptance and understanding of others who were challenged.
More than a memoir, THE GLASS STRAW provides insight into pre-WWII and wartime middle-America, from the innocence of young girls playing hopscotch and young boys jumping trains, to nighttime travels in a delivery truck from Indiana to Chicago to pick up boxes for families to ship supplies to their overseas servicemen. Eleanor's lessons in perseverance continued to develop; they served her well when she married Bob who, despite the difficulties of medical school while they were newlyweds, was destined to become a beloved pediatrician, and Eleanor, a good doctor's wife. She never minded Bob's long days, phone calls from worried parents at all hours, or the sacrifices needed for his profession. After all, Eleanor knew firsthand how a frightened child felt, and that long after her own scars faded, it had taken longer for the ones inside to heal.