Archive for April, 2007
Story Time
For someone with a less-than-brilliant memory, I find that, nowadays, I know a lot of literature by heart. Not, unfortunately, great works of poetry or fiction, nor the kind of fact-packed books that would help me at work. No, I am now a human repository of nursery rhymes, childrens’ poetry and toddler books.
If you asked me to recite a Shakespeare sonnet, I’m afraid all you’d get is a blank look. Maybe, if you were lucky, a mumbled “Shall I compare thee to a Summer’s day, something, something, something, temperate and beautiful?”
A quote from a great thinker or famous wit, then? Still, you’d get nothing more than the sight of me looking alternately purplexed, befuddled and discombobulated*, which, if it hadn’t been you that asked the question, would probably incline you to point the way to the nearest public convenience.
Ask me to recite Us Two or Disobedience by A. A. Milne, though, or The Owl and the Pussycat and I’m there’s no stopping me (as much as you might wish there were). Or a trickier question – keep singing nursery rhymes with a tune to keep young children entertained for half an hour, an hour even? No problem. Songs with actions? Fine. The entirety of Fidgety Fish by Ruth Galloway (With Pop-Up Surprise)? “Tiddler was always fidgeting…”
The things is, though, that I don’t mind, really. I’m afraid that Evie, shocking as it is, doesn’t much like Shakespeare, Lettie finds the tunes in computer programming books just don’t meet her exacting standards, and while great thinkers and famous wits are all well and good, Jemjem reckons the actions to their quotes aren’t a patch on Wind the Bobbin Up or The Grand Old Duke of York.
Besides, books play a special role in our family. It can be hard to find ways to spend time in quiet, thoughtful activities when you’re alone with three one-year olds. It’s rare, for example, to find when building towers of bricks that all three girls are in the mood for building rather than demolishing, and any game involving carrying, lifting or climbing on Daddy generally ends prematurely when Daddy’s arms give out under the combined weight of three, wriggling twenty-five pound children.
But get out a book and it’s a race to clamber up on the sofa and sit in a line, to see what the story will be.
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Very observant readers may notice there’s a ring on J’s finger where before there was none. That’s because I recently proposed. It has three diamonds on it. One for each of the treasures she’s given to me.
* OK, I admit, my brain does seem to have quite a large compartment for keeping pointless words in. Anyone for defenestration?