Blog Archives

You're Classic, Harry!

7/31/2018

If it was Monday—and you could usually count on Dudley to know the days of the week, because of television—then tomorrow, Tuesday, was Harry’s eleventh birthday. Of course, his birthdays were never exactly fun—last year, the Dursleys had given him a coat hanger and a pair of Uncle Vernon’s old socks. Still, you weren’t eleven every day.
from: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
by J.K. Rowling
illustrated by Mary GrandPré
Scholastic, 1997

   Although I don’t remember my eleventh birthday celebration, and I’m sure I had one, I remember *being* eleven.
   Too old to play with dolls. Too young to have a boyfriend. Misunderstood by pretty much everyone, including myself. Eleven is hard. No wonder so many main characters are eleven.
   Even though Harry turns eleven every time I read the first book in his series, he’s really celebrating his 20th publication anniversary (in the United States).
   The books stayed on the best seller lists for at least two years. They have been translated into over 73 languages (including Latin and Ancient Greek) and made into full-length live-action movies.
   Harry Potter and his author, Jo (J.K.) Rowling, have become household names. Even people who haven’t read one word of one book can identify Harry, Ron, and Hermione. Even people who can’t spell Hermione, or pronounce her name correctly. (I listened to one of the books on a CD from the library and discovered the correct pronunciation.)
   Is Harry Potter a classic?
   What even makes a book a classic? Here’s my list based on my study of children’s literature, my experience as a children’s librarian, and my pleasure in reading to children, my own, my grandchildren, and story time kids.

Re-readablility: How many times can you read the same book and enjoy it? Can you find new details that add to your understanding or your child’s? Is it still fun to read and listen to?
Characterization: Are the characters real? Do they do real things and think real thoughts? Can you and your child both identify with them?
Philosophical: Does the book help you and your child understand what it means to be human? Life lessons in classic literature are hidden. They’re subtle. Are you still thinking and talking about the book and character(s) even after you finish reading it?
Emotional: Is the ending satisfying? Surprising, but tied up? Leave you feeling good? Even the sad ones, like Charlotte’s Web and Where the Red Fern Grows?
Sturdy: Is it able to stand the test of time?

   I didn’t read very much when I was young, mostly what I was assigned to read in school. It feels like I went straight from The Cat in the Hat to Little Women. My grandmother gave me her copy of Little Women when I was about 10. It took me two years to read that book! but I finished it. And I liked it.
   Even though mom took me to the library pretty often and I joined the Summer Reading Club every summer, I’m hard-pressed to think of even one title on my list right now.
   I was grown-up (and so were my kids) when Harry Potter first appeared. And my oldest grandson was only six, so I read that on my own. I had to wait till J.K. finished writing the next and the next until I finally closed the covers on the seventh book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
   What kept me going back for more? They must be classics!
-—stay curious!

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A Week at Camp Mie-Mie Pop Pop

7/24/2018

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Froggy woke up
and bounced on his bed—boing! boing! boing!
“Yippee!” he sang.
“We’re gong to Grandma’s!”
And he jumped off . . .
Weeeeee!
and got dressed—zip! zoop! zup! zut! zut! zat!
Frrooggyy!
Called his mother.
“Wha-a-a-a-t?”
“It’s time to pack for our trip, dear!”
“I already di-i-i-id!” he said.
from: Froggy Goes to Grandma’s
by Jonathan London
illustrated by Frank Remkiewcz
Viking, 2017

   My granddaughter, Ellie, arrived yesterday for a week at Camp Mie-Mie Pop Pop. Her family lives several hours away so it took planning and arranging to make the week happen.
   When my sister and brother and I were young, our visits to Grandma’s and Grandpa’s often turned into a spontaneous overnight stay for one or another of us.
   We were lucky enough to have our gram, too. Grandma’s mother lived with Grandma and Grandpa in their home in a nice suburb of Cleveland. Gram’s accent sounded like the “old country” and reminded me how brave she was to leave everything and everyone she knew to come here and raise her three-year-old daughter. Gram was a proud American. She was sure of herself, too.
   After dinner we’d sometimes play Parcheesi, or a card game. Grandpa liked Crazy 8s. There was another card game that involved math, but I don’t remember how to play that one. When I was sent to get ready for bed the call, “Don’t forget to brush your teeth,” trailed me upstairs.
And there was Gram. To make sure.
   I had traded my day clothes for one of Grandpa’s undershirts and heard Gram clomp upstairs in her tie-up black shoes. She followed me into the bathroom with what she insisted was toothpaste. Of course I had not brought my own. Gram and I shared a bathroom and I expected I’d use hers.
   Gram was fluent in at least three languages, but she never mastered written English. I was around Ellie’s age, 6, and could read a little. I truly knew the difference between Colgate Toothpaste and Colgate Shave Cream. Gram was not holding the toothpaste.
   “Gram,” I said as politely as I could. I was not used to correcting anyone in charge of me. “That is not toothpaste.” She insisted that she knew what she was doing.
   “It’s Grandpa’s shaving cream,” I continued. My heart was thumping in my ears now. And Gram was even more insistent, certain I was trying to get out of brushing my teeth. It was not going to happen on her watch. She squeezed a generous amount on a spare toothbrush.
   “Smell it,” I pleaded. But Gram did not back down.
   That night I brushed my teeth with Grandpa’s Colgate. I can still taste the sharp soapiness. It was hard to rinse, too.
   I’m sure Gram realized her mistake, but didn’t say anything to me. I decided not to say anything either.
   When her mom helped Ellie unpack, we discovered that she had forgotten her toothpaste. I only have the minty kind and she likes watermelon.
   Dinner eaten, clothes changed, stories read. It was time to brush her teeth.
   When Ellie balked at the minty tube of Colgate, I assured her that the act of brushing was almost as important as the fact of toothpaste. Ellie brushed with plain water last night.
   We have lots planned for Ellie’s week at Camp Mie-Mie Pop-Pop. A magic show at the Library. A trip to the Children’s Museum. Blueberrying at the local farm. Playgrounds, bike rides, restaurant lunches, and for sure, a trip to the store to pick up some watermelon toothpaste.
—stay curious!

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Good Sport

7/17/2018

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   Amelia Bedelia adored her bike. It was a great bike. It was fast and dependable and she had learned to ride on it. She could tell you how it had gotten every dent. She could tell you what had chipped each fragment of paint from the frame and what had made those rusty scratches on the chrome. She could match each insult to her bike to an injury on her body: scabs on her knees, scrapes to her elbows, bruises on her shins, and a tiny sliver of a scar under her chin.
from: Amelia Bedelia Means Business
by Herman S. Parish III
Illustrations by Lynne Avril
HarperCollins ebooks, 2013

   These past weeks have played host to several major sports events. You know already that I am not much of an enthusiast of any particular sport, but I do like to stay aware of what is going on around me.
   The World Cup just finished up, crowning France the winner of this major world event (for which the United States failed to qualify). The next match is scheduled for 2022 in Qatar. An American team should have plenty of practice time, in case anyone is interested in representing the United States on the World Stage.
   One of my jobs when I worked at the Wilson factory was washing soccer balls before they were packed and shipped out to the stores for sale. So I’m kinda familiar with the way they are put together. But not so much what to do with one.
   The closest I ever got to actually playing soccer was a week or so of field hockey in our high-school phys. ed. curriculum. I don’t think hockey and soccer are alike, but we ran back and forth on a grassy field. I remember a ball was involved, or maybe it was something else.
   Both of my granddaughters play soccer during the late spring. They like it, so, I guess that’s something. I’ve watched them play a time or two, but it was a little hard for me to focus on the game. I was mostly watching “my girls.”
The Tour de France began on July 7 and the riders will finish in Paris on July 29. It is a rigorous route about 2,200 miles long. Five Americans are competing this year.
   They say once you learn how to ride a bicycle, you don’t ever forget. That’s not really one-hundred percent true. It comes back, but it takes a real desire, lots of perseverance, and fully inflated tires. I ride so I can listen to the wind blow past my ears. I ride to cool off on a hot day. I ride to prove to myself that I can. I like to stay on flat pavement away from traffic like a bike trail or our county fairgrounds. I don’t ride to go anywhere. I thought I’d like to ride to the library or the grocery store. I did do that once or twice, but I felt unbalanced with groceries or books in my basket.
   Tennis competition is finishing up, too. This past Saturday, Serena Williams got knocked out of a Grand Slam. Her baby is not even a year old, yet, so I think just making it to Wimbledon was exceptional. She does, too.
   Several girls on my hall in my dorm decided Spring Quarter was the perfect time for us to learn tennis. Some may have played before, but we signed up together and went at it. After mastering the rules and taking a written test, we began the actual playing. We all gained a lot of respect for our racquets after one of us was knocked out cold by one other of us. No lasting damage was done and we all learned to give each other lots of personal space. Not a bad rule in general.
   And baseball is taking a mid-season break. The 89th Major League Baseball All-Star Game is scheduled for 7:30 tonight in Washington DC. Rain is predicted. Although an All-Star game has never been rained-out, adjustments have been made in the past, and contingency plans are in the works for tonight, just in case.
   So, in light of summits and nominations and baseball, I guess you could say my own contingency plans are in the works, too. After all, Mom liked to remind me that I have two ears and one mouth for a good reason!
I'll keep listening hard, to make sure I'll have lots to write about in the weeks to come!
-—stay curious!

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Bill of Sale...Bill of Goods...Bill of Rights

7/10/2018

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“Government doesn’t seem to be an easy business,” Charlie Brown observed.
   Linus agreed. “Freedom isn’t a very easy business either, Charlie Brown.”
   But finally, on June 21, 1788, New Hampshire cast the deciding vote to approve the Constitution! The United States had become truly united. . .
from: Here’s to You, America!
by Charles M. Schulz
adapted by Justine and Ron Fontes
interior art adapted by Paige Braddock
Little Simon, 2002

   And less than four years later, on December 15, 1791, the Bill of Rights became law.
   Society needs rules. Our Constitution weaves the fabric, devises the organization, and supports the structure of our Democracy. From the early drafts of the Constitution, the founders sought a balance between individual rights and the general good of all people.
In its preamble, the document declares a majority rule in the first three words: We the People. When we acknowledge this consensus as the backbone of our Justice system and Legal system, we cement our responsibility to each other.
   The point of the Constitution is to establish a government of the people, for the people, and by the people.
   The point of the Bill of Rights is to protect those very people, us, from the government. Protecting the minorities and individuals from the majority.
But sometimes bad laws are made.
The most recent example of a bad law is the immigration fiasco. The resulting horror and tragedy are still very much with us. In defense of that bad law, Jeff Sessions, Attorney General of the United States, quoted the Christian Bible, specifically Romans 13, the same passage that was used to defend slavery! How dare he quote a Bible verse as his authority to enforce a bad law!
Sessions claims he is broadening the interpretation of the Religious Freedom guaranteed in the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights. If he *really* believes in Religious Freedom, he needs to stick to the Constitution and Bill of Rights as his authority, not the Christian Bible.
   Here’s what Martin Luther King, Jr. had to say about following the Law:
One may well ask: ‘How can you advocate breaking some
laws and obeying others?’ The answer lies in the fact that there are
   two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate
obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility
   to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to
   disobey unjust laws.
from his "Letter from Birmingham Jail"
   If Sessions can change the law of the land to allow the majority to run rough-shod over individuals, whether those individuals are physically, emotionally, or intellectually disabled, whether those individuals are economically struggling, whether those individuals hold a minority religious belief, or whether they are members of the LGBTQ community, and claim his authority is the G-d *he* believes in, we are all in serious trouble.
   Rules are a part of life. Some people are rule-makers. Some people are balkers. Some are rule-breakers. Being a bit of a rule follower has kept me out of heaps of trouble of one kind or another.
   My parents were rule-makers. Especially Mom. But in a good way. Wash and brush. Walk your bike across the streets, clean your room.
   Then, later on: Be home by midnight, watch out for your little brother, set priorities.
   Then I was on my own and needed my own rules. Respect Life. Respect Earth. Respect Self. These are not easy rules to follow. But life, generally is not easy.
   Probably, it is not meant to be.
-—stay curious!

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On the Wilder Side

7/3/2018

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   The sunshine was blistering, even the winds were hot, and the prairie grasses were turning yellow. … But Laura liked the fierce light and the sun and the wind, and she couldn’t stay away from the well. But she was not allowed to go near its edge.
from: Little House on the Prairie
       written by Laura Ingalls Wilder
illustrated by Garth Williams
HarperCollins, 1935 text (illus. copyright 1953)

When my girls and I were still reading stories together, one time, we chose Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder. The story was engaging, the characters were interesting, and the setting … it felt like we were right there on the prairie with Pa and Ma and the girls.
Although five of Mrs. Wilder’s books won Newbery honor awards in the 1940s and 50s, Little House was not one of them. In 1954, though, she was honored by the Services to Children division of the American Library Association with a named award for the body of her work. The Laura Ingalls Wilder Award recognizes an author’s lasting and substantial contribution to children’s literature.
   On Monday, last week, during the ALA Annual Conference and Exhibition in New Orleans, a name change was voted in. The Board of the Association of Library Service to Children (ALSC) changed the name of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award to the Children's Literature Legacy Award.
   For anyone who thinks the decision for the name change is an attempt to discredit Mrs. Wilder or her legacy or is curious, here’s what I found.
   Her books are not being censored. They are a product of the time in which she lived. Just like Mark Twain’s racism has been called out, so has Laura Ingalls Wilder’s.
   Taken and taught or discussed in their historical context is crucial to defining how we see ourselves today. Recognizing the bigotry proves we are moving, however slowly, in the right direction.
   Regarding the name change, the ALSC states: While we are committed to preserving access to Wilder’s work for readers, we must also consider if her legacy today does justice to this particular award for lifetime achievement, given by an organization committed to all children. http://www.ala.org/alsc/awardsgrants
ALSC recognizes the author’s legacy is complex and Wilder’s work is not universally embraced. Mrs. Wilder’s body of work continues to be a focus of scholarship and literary analysis, which often brings to light anti-Native and anti-Black sentiments in her work.
   Again, according to their website: ALSC works to promote excellence in literature for children that aligns with our core values of inclusiveness, integrity and respect, and responsiveness . . .
   ALA President Jim Neal and ALSC President Nina Lindsay released the following joint statement: …“This decision was made after much consideration and fact-finding. It is one that we believe serves the best interests of ALSC and all of those they serve, not only now, in 2018, but also in the long-term.”
   When I checked my library’s website, I found a copy of Little House on the Prairie on the shelf of my local branch. I waited a day, which turned out to be a day too late. When I got there, I found a long hole where all of the Wilder books had been. Oh, but this is the library. The children’s librarian told me a digital copy was available. So when I got home, I tried that angle only to be disappointed again. In just the short time it took to walk home and fire up my iPad, no available copies, again. Well, I have Libby downloaded from my library’s website and I can add lots of library cards to my record. Turns out I have lots of library cards. I downloaded a copy from CleveNet and started reading.
   I found the prejudice and ugly passages, but I found child-friendly descriptive passages of real fear and its resolution. I found beautiful descriptions of the wild scenery and cooking smells and sounds of fiddles and laughter.
   I’m sure, for those reasons and many others, the Little House books have found their place in history. They teach lessons of love and acceptance, if we choose to read them in their context and ours.
     I’m glad I took the time to re-read one of them.
—stay curious!

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"Small acts of kindness can change and humanise our world."
Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks 1948-2020
Chief Rabbi of Great Britain, 1991-2020
Author, Advocate, Advisor

You're Classic, Harry!

A Week at Camp Mie-Mie Pop Pop

Good Sport

Bill of Sale...Bill of Goods...Bill of Rights

On the Wilder Side

I'm a children's writer and poet intent on observing the world and nurturing those I find in my small space .

Archives

"Small acts of kindness can change and humanise our world." Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks 1948-2020 ​Chief Rabbi of Great Britain, 1991-2020 Author, Advocate, Advisor

You're Classic, Harry!

A Week at Camp Mie-Mie Pop Pop

Good Sport

Bill of Sale...Bill of Goods...Bill of Rights

On the Wilder Side

I'm a children's writer and poet intent on observing the world and nurturing those I find in my small space .

Archives

"Small acts of kindness can change and humanise our world."
Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks 1948-2020
Chief Rabbi of Great Britain, 1991-2020
Author, Advocate, Advisor