Breathing Lessons By Anne Tyler

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I just finished reading “Breathing Lessons” by Anne Tyler. It’s one of the books I ordered from Thriftbooks.

And it’s one of my very favorite books of all time. I just had to share it with you today.

I think I’ve now read “Breathing Lessons” three times over the years since it was first published in 1988. The book won The Pulitzer Prize in 1989.

There’s just something about this book that speaks to me. So I imagine I’ll be reading it for a fourth time.

This book begins and ends in just one day, but a lot happens.

Ira & Maggie Moran’s Day Trip:

Ira and Maggie Moran are headed to a funeral. Maggie’s best friend Serena has just lost her husband. The day trip will take the couple from Baltimore to Deer Lick, Pennsylvania.

You will love Maggie. She is lovable but a bit ditzy. She’s always getting into the middle of other people’s affairs, which aggravates Ira to no end.

Ira is very reasonable and efficient. He’s logical and rational.

Ira can’t understand how Maggie can be so featherbrained, though he’s lived with her for decades and they have two adult children.

If you had to choose a crayon color for Maggie, it would be a spirited bright red. And Ira’s color would probably be a dull gray.

How The Day Begins:

Maggie doesn’t set the alarm for the right time, so they wake up late and are rushed. Ira heads to his frame shop to leave a note for his customers to let them know he’ll be away for the day.

Maggie is to pick up their car from the body shop where the exterior was being fixed. They straightened the rear bumper, replaced the mangled trunk lid, ironed out a half-dozen crimps here and there, and covered the rust on the doors.

When she sees their old Dodge all fixed up and looking new, she realizes that Ira was right. They don’t need a new car.

Maggie’s Incident With A Pepsi Truck:

She is listening to the radio and thinks she hears her son’s ex-wife on a talk show saying she’s getting remarried. This throws Maggie into a tizzy. She always thought that Fiona and Jesse would eventually get back together. After all, they have a child.

This will be a recurring theme in the book.

Maggie is so distracted that she means to hit the brakes and hits the accelerator instead.

The car shoots out of the body shop garage. A Pepsi truck approaching from the left smashes into her left front fender. It was the only spot, until now, that hadn’t the slightest thing wrong with it.

Maggie drives away before the Pepsi truck driver can get out of his truck. Which she thinks is just as well considering the look on his face.

As she drives on a bit, she realizes that the fender is making a very upsetting noise.

So she pulls over, gets out of the car, and tries to pull the fender away from the tire. Maggie manages to tug it away enough to make the car drivable. She notices that the new paint job is flaking off.

Maggie then drives to the shop to pick up Ira.

Ira’s expression was a study as he approached the car. Starting out pleased and approving, he rounded the hood and drew up short when he came upon the left fender.

This of course does not bode well for a happy day trip together. But he tells her to move over and he gets behind the wheel. There’s nothing to be done about it right now.

Another Scene:

Maggie: “The other day, Maggie told Ira, “I forgot how to say ‘car pool.'”

Ira: “Why would you need to remember?” Ira asked.

Maggie: “Well, that’s my point.”

Ira: “Pardon?”

Maggie: “It shows you how time has passed, is what I’m saying. I wanted to tell one of my patients (she’s an aide at a funeral home) her daughter wouldn’t be visiting. I said ‘Today’s her day for, um’, and I couldn’t think of the words. I could not think of car pool,'”

“But it seems like just last week that Jesse had a game or hockey camp. Daisy had a brownie meeting. Why, I used to spend all Saturday behind the wheel!”

Ira: “Speaking of which,” Ira said. “Was it another vehicle you hit? Or just a telephone pole?”

Maggie dug in her purse for her sunglasses. “It was a truck,” she said.

Ira: “Good grief. You do it any damage?”

Maggie: “I didn’t notice.”

Ira: “You didn’t notice.”

Maggie: “I didn’t stop to look.” She put on her sunglasses and blinked. Everything turned muted and more elegant.

Ira: “You left the scene of an accident, Maggie?”

Maggie: “It wasn’t an accident? It was only one of those, little, like, kind of things that just happen. Why make such a big deal about it?”

Getting Things Straight:

Ira: “Let me get this straight,” Ira said. “You zoomed out of the body shop, slammed into a truck, and kept on going.”

Maggie: “No, the truck slammed into me.“

Ira: “But you were the one at fault.”

Maggie: “Well yes, I suppose I was, if you insist on holding someone to blame.”

Ira: “And so then you just drove on away.”

Maggie: “Right.”

He was silent. Not a good silence..

Maggie: “It was a great big Pepsi truck,” Maggie said. “It was practically an armored tank! I bet I didn’t so much as scratch it.”

Then Ira asks Maggie about the map.

Maggie Forgets The Map

The first thing she manages to forget is the map.

Ira: “I asked you when we were setting out, remember? I said, Are you going to bring the map, or am I. You said I’ll just stick it in my purse.”

Maggie: “Well, I don’t know why you’re making such a fuss about it. All we’ve got to do is watch the road signs; anyone could manage that.”

Ira: “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

Maggie: “Besides, we’ve got those directions Serena gave me over the phone.”

Ira: “Maggie. Do you honestly believe any directions of Serena’s could get us where we care to go? Ha! We’d find ourselves in Canada someplace. We’d be off in Arizona!”

Maggie: “Well, you don’t have to get so excited about it.”

Ira: “We would never see home again.”

Maggie’s Mishaps:

So before they’ve even begun their trip, Maggie has had an incident with a Pepsi truck and forgot the map.

Scenes like this materialize throughout the book about just one day in the life of Ira and Maggie Moran.

They stop along the way and Maggie manages to get into a detailed conversation with the waitress at a diner. She talks about things Ira wishes she wouldn’t divulge to a total stranger.

I laughed all the way through this book. It’s like a breath of fresh air.

Maggie and Ira are exasperated with one another from the get-go. And they’re stuck in a car together for a long day trip. The things they’ve lived with decades but don’t like about one another is magnified.

I think you’ll be delighted with this light-hearted book. After all, it won the Pulitzer Prize for a reason.