Not That There's Anything Wrong With That
Posted by Well Read Hostess at 4/30/2008 9:08 PM and is filed under WRH,Parent of the Year,On the Nightstand 
I wouldn't call myself a mommyblogger. You know, those women who are taking over the internet and the world?
Not that there's anything wrong with that. Some of my best friends are mommybloggers. (Really??? No. But you get the point.)
I do, recognize, however, that I occasionally make a sidestep into mommyblogger turf. And so, I sidestep.
Most summers, I try to pick a theme for my reading. Until I wrote that sentence and heard it in my head, I didn't realize just how much of a freak nerd dork I really am...breathe deeply.
One summer it was Fitzgerald. Fun...but ultimately a wee bit repetitive.
One summer it was, or was supposed to be, The Russians. I got bored with this very quickly and didn't make it far. Russians are meant to be read in winter, I reckon.
One summer it was Latin American Women. That was a good summer. Like Water for Chocolate, some Allende. Arriba.
Last summer, in anticipation of the release of the last Harry Potter, I re-read all the earlier ones. Then the seventh...in about fifteen minutes. Not quite. But my kids ate a lot of cereal and wore the same clothes for two and a half days.
Yeah. Ok. I'm a nerd.
I have been looking forward to sharing these books with my kids for a long time. I read one of them on my honeymoon (it just keeps getting worse, doesn't it? The nerdy thing? I think it's too late to bail myself out now). I started imagining reading the books to my not-yet-conceived-of nor-yet-conceived children then.
The older niblet has been going back and forth about his readiness to approach the books for over a year. Last summer, witnessing his mother's obsessive interest in all things Potter, he was game. Then he started to ask questions about the plot, and he backed off for a while.
My oldest child, not unlike his mother, tends towards the fearful. I may talk a big game, but I harbor great anxiety abouteverything I can't control immediately and directly by my own will that which I don't completely understand (rodents, nuclear holocaust, cancer, organ meats, Republicans). He is better at managing change than I am, and he constantly surprises me with his courage trying new things - food, school, sports, adventures, but we both psych ourselves out ahead of time when we anticipate the potential for tension.
Best example: he cannot watch Curious George. The knowledge that George is going to get himself into some kind of trouble makes my son crazy. He will run screaming from the room when this MONKEY CARTOON is on. Mr. Bean - same thing. He gets that the premise of the comedy is that Mr. Bean screws up and hilarity ensues, but the anticipation of the screw-ups is more than he can tolerate.
So the boy knows that Harry's parents die, and that Harry ultimately has to go mano a mano with a bad dude named Voldemort. He's been chewing on this knowledge for about eight months. I have been purposely quiet on the Potter subject for some time. A few days ago, he asked me if there were movies of all the books, and I explained that no, so far there were only five, but rest assured, the good people at Warner Brothers were doing everything in their power to drain every last nickel out of the series and there surely would be HP 6 and HP 7 before we knew it.
Ok. Question asked and answered. All quiet on the HP front.
Tonight after dinner, a little voice piped up from the back seat. "I'm ready for Harry Potter. Tonight. Chapter 1."
I DID NOT immediately pull over, get out of the car, and do an impromptu hoochy hoochy dance on the shoulder as I wanted to, but said in as reserved a manner as I could, "Great."
We got home late - finally bought a GD kitchen sink - functioning kitchen date TBA but closer than it was - and after jammies and teeth brushing (yay! Jammies! Brushed Teeth! Another day without Children and Youth coming to clap me in leg irons!) and into bed we went to start reading HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE.
He was quiet, maybe a little nervous, but he snuggled up and I read. At one point he asked if I could warn him ahead of time if a description of the deaths of James and Lily Potter was imminent. I agreed. We proceeded. I did voices, I did drama, I did humor, I did it all. I was having the time of my life. It was a dream come true! My boy! Me! Reading Harry Potter! I got to the end of the chapter, I closed the book and looked down at my big boy's beautiful face, my own face expectant and joyful.
He was sound asleep.
Of course.
Not that there's anything wrong with that. Some of my best friends are mommybloggers. (Really??? No. But you get the point.)
I do, recognize, however, that I occasionally make a sidestep into mommyblogger turf. And so, I sidestep.
Most summers, I try to pick a theme for my reading. Until I wrote that sentence and heard it in my head, I didn't realize just how much of a freak nerd dork I really am...breathe deeply.
One summer it was Fitzgerald. Fun...but ultimately a wee bit repetitive.
One summer it was, or was supposed to be, The Russians. I got bored with this very quickly and didn't make it far. Russians are meant to be read in winter, I reckon.
One summer it was Latin American Women. That was a good summer. Like Water for Chocolate, some Allende. Arriba.
Last summer, in anticipation of the release of the last Harry Potter, I re-read all the earlier ones. Then the seventh...in about fifteen minutes. Not quite. But my kids ate a lot of cereal and wore the same clothes for two and a half days.
Yeah. Ok. I'm a nerd.
I have been looking forward to sharing these books with my kids for a long time. I read one of them on my honeymoon (it just keeps getting worse, doesn't it? The nerdy thing? I think it's too late to bail myself out now). I started imagining reading the books to my not-yet-conceived-of nor-yet-conceived children then.
The older niblet has been going back and forth about his readiness to approach the books for over a year. Last summer, witnessing his mother's obsessive interest in all things Potter, he was game. Then he started to ask questions about the plot, and he backed off for a while.
My oldest child, not unlike his mother, tends towards the fearful. I may talk a big game, but I harbor great anxiety about
Best example: he cannot watch Curious George. The knowledge that George is going to get himself into some kind of trouble makes my son crazy. He will run screaming from the room when this MONKEY CARTOON is on. Mr. Bean - same thing. He gets that the premise of the comedy is that Mr. Bean screws up and hilarity ensues, but the anticipation of the screw-ups is more than he can tolerate.
So the boy knows that Harry's parents die, and that Harry ultimately has to go mano a mano with a bad dude named Voldemort. He's been chewing on this knowledge for about eight months. I have been purposely quiet on the Potter subject for some time. A few days ago, he asked me if there were movies of all the books, and I explained that no, so far there were only five, but rest assured, the good people at Warner Brothers were doing everything in their power to drain every last nickel out of the series and there surely would be HP 6 and HP 7 before we knew it.
Ok. Question asked and answered. All quiet on the HP front.
Tonight after dinner, a little voice piped up from the back seat. "I'm ready for Harry Potter. Tonight. Chapter 1."
I DID NOT immediately pull over, get out of the car, and do an impromptu hoochy hoochy dance on the shoulder as I wanted to, but said in as reserved a manner as I could, "Great."
We got home late - finally bought a GD kitchen sink - functioning kitchen date TBA but closer than it was - and after jammies and teeth brushing (yay! Jammies! Brushed Teeth! Another day without Children and Youth coming to clap me in leg irons!) and into bed we went to start reading HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE.
He was quiet, maybe a little nervous, but he snuggled up and I read. At one point he asked if I could warn him ahead of time if a description of the deaths of James and Lily Potter was imminent. I agreed. We proceeded. I did voices, I did drama, I did humor, I did it all. I was having the time of my life. It was a dream come true! My boy! Me! Reading Harry Potter! I got to the end of the chapter, I closed the book and looked down at my big boy's beautiful face, my own face expectant and joyful.
He was sound asleep.
Of course.
HA! I love it...sound asleep. Sounds like what happened to us when we attempted it. But now that he can basically read it himself...
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Hey--I do the same thing with my summer reading. I did Hemingway and Fitzgerald one summer. I did Latino writers another. Indian writers another (in many ways they are similar to the Latinos and use a lot of magical realism). Last summer I read a lot of Sandra Dallas. She is a much lighter read. I haven't even attempted the Russians. I think it would take me an entire summer to finish one book.
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J is very intrepid! Max, 3 years his senior, is still cautiously dancing around the idea of actually reading HP. Interest there, but guard still up. We're on a Penderwicks role -- great group read with spunky girls.
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this comment has next to nothing to do with- okay it has absolutely nothing to do with- the point you were making, but I have to tell you...are you ready?...curious george is really NOT a monkey. Note the absence of a tail. I know, it's hard to accept, and I hate to be the one to break the news, but it is what it is. sigh.
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