Journal of a Sabbatical

December 4, 1998

a 500 page book

Andrea wants a 500-page book for Christmas. Mere 300-page books are no longer enough for her. She wants them to last longer. I can sympathize with her. I remember often feeling unready to leave the world created in a good book.

I don't know if the Bobbsey Twins tomes I scored at the used book shop will satisfy her. The longest one is only 238 pages, but with all the books in the series the Bobbsey Twins universe goes on for years. It's amazing how long Freddie and Flossie stay four years old!

I chatted with Kevin on the phone last night about the books for Andrea dilemma. I'd love to give her Moby Dick, my personal favorite but she's still too young for it. Not in terms of reading level, but in terms of being able to handle the themes and issues and ideas. She reads at some phenomenal grade level well about her actual grade level of second grade. How do you find a book that is long, satisfying, and challenging to a really good reader yet suitable for a second grade maturity level?

I read 1984 and Brave New World both when I was 13 and had totalitarian nightmares for years. I was fully capable of intellectually understanding communism and socialism and totalitarianism and all the other isms but I was not emotionally mature enough to grok them on a level that made sense to me. I'm certainly not thinking about giving the kids 1984 or Brave New World. I'm not sure I'd ever give them to them. And I was in 7th grade at that time. Lizzy's in 5th grade and Andrea in second.

A second grader is basically just coming out of the "magic years", learning the difference between imagination and reality.

Tonight I scanned the bookshelves while the kids were watching tv, to make sure I didn't duplicate any of the classics of children's' literature that Grandma had already given them. They've got The Wind in the Willows, Heidi, Little Women... I tried to get Andrea interested in Little Women but she claimed it was a dumb book. She's in the midst of reading Farm Boy, which I've never heard of. I bet someday she spontaneously picks up Little Women and devours it.

The big question I have is why children's books are so, as Andrea puts it, "cinchy" now. Everything in bookstores is carefully labeled by age and grade level, except for what they call "classics", which are the things like The Wind in the Willows, Heidi, Little Women... So what if a kid has to look up a word in the dictionary? I have to look up words in the dictionary. Books should be challenging, interesting, and exciting. They should open the world up to a child. Get the kid to think in new ways...

Anyway, between TGIF shows we went over some of the other items on their lists, mostly craft oriented stuff from Learning Express. Andrea told me: "Just go to Learning Express!" Then she wanted to know what I want for Christmas. She wants to give me cable and a VCR so I can watch the TGIF lineup when I'm not with them. Sweet thought. But tv just doesn't do much for me. I should get cable and a vcr anyway once I get a new tv. My tv is so old it's not cable ready and it doesn't have a remote! I meant it when I said tv doesn't do much for me. But it would be nice to be able to watch the Red Sox on tv without seeing two of every player, and to be able to rent movies when I'm home and not just when I'm at Nancy's.

One last thing: the moonrise was spectacular tonight. I watched it in my rearview mirror on 495 on the way to Groton. A pale pink gigantic orb rising above the treetops like something wholly other and even remoter than earth orbit ... something in a primitive dream ...