Spectacular! As it happens, there is a book that can satisfy all of those things- From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Were there any mysteries and secrets in this recent exhibit? I certainly hope so.Atheneum Books for Young Readers: New York, 2007 originally published in 1967. In fact, I just saw a Michelangelo exhibit twice and I thought about From the Mixed-Up Files as I viewed the magnificent sketches, drawings, and marble statues. I live about a ten-minute walk away, and I visit and take art history classes there often. I will always have a love affair with the MET. And, like Claudia, the MET is also my secret place. Because the secretness of the place had already seeped into my pores and my being. But to me, as to Claudia, that doesn’t really matter. Apparently, it was on the road between New York City and my college, Wells College, and also on the way to Cornell, so hundreds of my fellow students talked about stopping at the Roscoe Diner, my not-so-secret place. the diner wasn’t really a secret as I discovered much later. It was my secret because I wasn’t allowed to eat bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches at home, since my father kept kosher, but we ate them at the Roscoe Diner when my father was back at work in New York City.

When I was young, I ate lunch there often each summer visiting dear family friends. My secret place was a diner called the Roscoe Diner, in upstate New York.

Here’s my second secret: Like Claudia who secretly lived in the Metropolitan Museum, I had a secret place. But when I was a girl, this was simply “my favorite book” for many reasons. And, just this summer, the MET organized a 50th anniversary Mixed-up Files celebration. Little did I realize as a child that my favorite book would become a movie starring Ingrid Bergman and a television movie starring Lauren Bacall, and that the Met Museum would create a MuseumKids tour brochure (“The Mixed-up Files” Issue) focused on the book. And I even wrote a parent-child book club discussion guide about the book. As an adult, I read it with my three daughters and created a museum treasure hunt to find all the Met references. At the time, I didn’t grasp the enormity of the acclaim that the book received, including The Newbery Medal for distinguished contribution to American literature for children. I read it several times as a young girl, and my parents took me quite often to the Met Museum, where we would recreate all the scenes that the author describes, including lunch in the glorious fountain restaurant that is now the renovated Greek and Roman Galleries.

First, my secret thought was that this book – my favorite book growing up – was my own discovery.

From the mixed up files of basil e