The older boys and I started a new book tonight.
Words have forever been a passion of mine. Reading, writing, listening to an aunt or my grandma re-tell the same story I loved the first and fifth and tenth time it was shared.
I also had the gift of a librarian for a mother.
I would visit her often when she was in charge of the library at school. From time to time she’d pull a book off a shelf and tell me, “I think you should read this. I have a feeling you might like it.”
Usually it was a book I wouldn’t have considered. I was likely in a Babysitter’s Club or Boxcar Children phase when she handed me Island of the Blue Dolphin.
I’m certain I would have skimmed past Bridge to Teribithia if she hadn’t insisted it was worth at least “the first 100 pages”.
“Just give it a chance.”
These two books, among others, still rest on my book shelf. Carried from my childhood home to college to my first apartment to my first home to my present home. I developed such a strong connection to something or someone within the pages of those books.
As I pull books for my own boys I find myself becoming my mother. Seeking books outside their comfort zones or what they might initially pull from the shelves.
I skim the pages of books in bookstores, in libraries, and contemplate if this might be a book that will sweep them off their feet – even if they question the cover at first.
So tonight we start a new book and I see the raised eyebrows. My oldest asks to read the title of the book again.
“Huh,” he says, “I guess we’ll give it a try.”
A page and a half in the three of us begin to laugh. The book, the novel, is funny. It’s also intelligent, thoughtful, and even has drawings for all of us to peer into every few pages. But it’s not the usual fare, it’s exceptional.
Maybe this will be the book they will carry with them, discover over and over again, and move with them when they go.
If not, I will keep searching for the next one. Just as my mother was always a step ahead of me and my journey through words.
Embracing Next 