sign me up
by bam
they even gave me popcorn. a little cellophane-wrapped folded-up bag of unpopped kernels, to tuck in the microwave and listen to it do its rat-a-tat.
and a purple folder. and a recommended reading list. and all the rules.
oh, yes, oh yes, they did. and i am, you can maybe tell, as giddy as a girl in pigtails bouncing down the library stairs.
which is what i used to be. which is, all the doctor phils of the world would tell us, who i am today. my inner child must be a little girl who knows no grander glee than signing up for the summer reading program at the local library.
it’s what we did yesterday, me and m’ boys. it was the highlight of our first official monday of this here summer vacation, the start of the first full week of the 11 or 12 we’ve got (no one in this house seems to know just when this grand spell ends and we are in no hurry to check it out, i’ll tell you).
it was a toss-up: beach or bookshelves. and the bookshelves won. handily. the sand, we figured, will always be there. the little chart that counts the summer reading books, they might run out, you never know.
we all signed up, both boys and me. oh, yessiree.
the little one in the read-to-me plan. nestle in, sink your elbows and your shoulders in your mama’s side, turn the pages, take in the story, one book at a time, and you get an ice cream cone after 25. how fine is that?
the big one, the one who’s reading nietzsche and marx and everything under the sun about cameras, lenses and light, he went straight downstairs to where the grownups go. he got the popcorn too.
i imagine the two of us, inhaling handfuls of popcorn as we inhale our books. we’ll be sure to share with the little guy. long as he gives us a lick of his ice cream. can a summer get any more delicious?
i can see it, clear as if it wasn’t 40-something years ago, the little white folded sheet of librarian’s paper. an underwater scheme. and every time i read a book i got a little submarine stamp on the chart with my name on it. the one they kept, so proudly, right there on the library counter, in some sort of shoebox with alphabet dividers. i remember walking up to that librarian’s desk, there in the children’s section, announcing my name, reporting what i’d read since last time.
it was the honor roll of all honor rolls. i remember the end-of-summer reading party. we all got little cups of ice cream. vanilla. with a wooden spoon.
but mostly we got afternoons of reading. and reading. we got to bury our little noses in lewis carroll, and laura ingalls wilder. and best of all, frances hogdson burnett’s secret garden.
it was a rite of summer, it was a rite of being my mother’s child. my mother was a reader. and thus, we read too. like little ducks, we waddled in behind her. she split off to her corner of the library, we split off to ours.
we waddled out, an hour later, maybe longer, our arms growing, stretching, coming loose at the socket, under the weight of so many books. piled high, like up above. so many books you sometimes had to peek around the stack, to keep from tumbling down the steps.
and so, i’m the mama waddler now. i want my children to know, to love, the thrill of counting up the book list. to conquer ice cream maybe, but to conquer something more. to understand that to spend your summer afternoons tucked in a book is an adventure ride you’ll never ever, not in a million, or 50, years forget.
there is, i think, something to the structure of the summer reading program. the signing-up and all makes it feel official. like getting a driver’s license maybe. before you could ever reach the gas.
and then watching all the little stars–this year at our library it’s outer space and rocket ships that are the theme, there is always a theme, i can imagine the librarians meeting over sandwiches and coffee to come up with a theme to hook you in–and, one by one, the stars get colored in.
it makes it not so overwhelming to spend the summer reading books, when you count, one star at a time. and then, before you know it, you go back to school that much more in love with what’s tucked between the covers.
it is a heady thing, when you stop to think that once upon a time someone in this thing called civilization stopped to think it worth building whole temples to books and words and ideas. someone built a special house just for the love of letters.
and then, much later, some librarian looked at the whole long summer and realized that a little piece of folded-up paper, with stars and shapes to color in, could make the whole big temple come down a size, to fit in the palm and the heart of a little child, who thought it rather grand to sign up for a starship ride to books.
dear chair people, today marks six whole months, half a blessed year of meandering monday through friday. we have coursed many ups and downs, around some bends as well. i myself have had my breath taken away, more than once. it has been my daily intention to feed us all, to give us place and time to pause, to consider the not-oft considered. as it’s summer now, i am thinking we might all relish the lazy days before us, in the very best way. as one fine mind suggested, i might move the kitchen table outside, into the sunshine, make it a picnic table. if i’m so inspired i will pound out the usual meandering. but i might put out a recipe, a really juicy one. a one that shouts of summer. or maybe i will share some photos. my will, a.k.a. the manchild, is making art of what he sees around him, and you might like to see it too. if i find a really delicious paragraph in what i’m reading, i might lay that out for all to take a taste. or we might, perhaps, have another voice pull up a chair, with a meditation by someone other than just moi. it seems a right thing, a divine thing, to honor the season’s tempo and let things unspool here the way that summer does. each day there will indeed be something fresh and something new. but heaven only knows what will inspire us each day. for the six months past, with all my heart i thank you. this has been a little piece of paradise.
now, does anyone have anything to say about summer reading, the best, perhaps, that there is?
fred–a beautiful essay on summer reading programs. the wisdom of taking this journey into summer is instantly apparent from this piece. bravo!
Summer creatures after my own heart! I loved the summer book clubs at my library. I can even remember the librarians names. In the library of my early childhood years, the children’s library was in the basement of one the very few buildings that had survived the 1918 fire in Northern MN. This old brownstone building sat up on top of a hill and it became my favorite getaway every summer. I too would have stronger biceps by the end of the summer due to the piles of books I carried home each week.I can remember my mom going upstairs to the adult section, while I got the latest “Ramona and Beezus” chapter book, a biography on Sally Ride or a child’s how to book on how to start a neigborhood club. The sad reality for me at that point is that the how-to book was the biggest piece of fiction for me, because we did not live in a neighborhood, we lived in a home surrounded by 16 acres of woods. So… books became my friends on those summer days when my mom didn’t drive me to a friend’s house for a play date or we filled the car up with beach toys and headed to the local swimming pool. As I look back on it though, I find that those days spent reading in the hammock were rather divine.On another note, which might sound quite naive, I must admit that going to the public libary in my northern mn town of 10,000 people was also an experience of understanding diversity. You see, the only African American woman living in my town of 10,000 people was the librarian. Each week of the summer book program I would sit at the table with her and provide oral reports of the books I had read most recently. She would then point me in the direction of books that I never would have discovered on my own. She expanded my world in so many ways. I do not know what it was like for her to truly be a racial minority in our town, but I do know that she was the most amazing librarian and she helped me to discover Madeleine L’engle, Judy Blume, Shel Silverstein and so many other authors.One final note… here is a quote from one of Garrison Keillor’s columns in the Minneapolis Star Tribune: “How many readers of Edith Wharton have engaged in terrorist acts? I challenge you to name one. Therefore the reading of Edith Wharton, is a proven deterrent of terror. Do we need to wait until our cities lie in smoking ruins before we wake up to the fact that a first-class public library is a vital link in national defense?”Garrison Keillor arguing for better funding for public libraries
Half a blessed year of meandering–congratulations. I can’t imagine my typical week without a few dips of PUAC. Love the insights, the variety, the wisdom, the humor, and the comments. Most of all, I just love the author. Nicest genius you’ll ever meet.
SLJ–Where in Northern MN did you grow up? I love that the experience you had with the ONE African-American in your community showed you the way to books AND to understanding of racial diversity. I grew up in the Twin Cities in the 50s and 60s and have always felt I had more positive experience with integration of the races growing up there than anywhere else. Our next door neighbors were a family of two African-American physicians. My dad was the campaign manager for the Republican US (or State) Rep candidate who was black (he lost.) I had African-American and Asian classmates in Elementary School and we all played at each others’ houses. But, I digress… I, too, recall the summer reading club at my library. I remember my friend and I taking out a bunch of books on judo, then flipping each other on the lawn (trying to avoid “doggie do” (in a time before people had to clean up after their dogs) so we could learn martial arts. I remember the musty smell of the book A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I remember how overjoyed my father was with the library when he misread the title of the book I had brought home in 4th or 5th grade. It was “Centerburg” Tales. He thought I was a young genius checking out “Canterbury” tales.
oh barbie, you know i share the joy of our town library. the one with a most distinctive scent like new toys. the one with the sweet tree house doll house that was my one regret in growing older- when i became aware that i would look silly creating stories for the creatures, little figures like talisman in my paws, who lived there. this same library that fed my mom’s hunger growing up and where at an early age she took us in pajamas on hot summer nights to bedtime reading events. where i later would pedal my schwinn and seek refuge among the stacks and meat locker cool of the air conditioning. this place where i proudly displayed my doll collection in the glass case where kids showed off their interests. the same case that later displayed a photo and profile of me because of my ‘battle of the books’ team standing. this place that still takes up a large chunk within me. well, you have inspired me to stop by the branch library in my neighborhood and sign up for a summer of reading.