For the first four, maybe five, years of Abby's life, she would wake up at 5:45 in the morning, leap out of bed, throw her door open and sprint down the hall -- bump, bump, bump, bump, bump -- and into our bedroom. Depending on who was on Morning Duty that day, Jenny or I would hoist ourselves out of bed, take Abby by the hand, and stagger back to her room to (a) organize her Playmobil farm, (b) play Dora "Chutes and Ladders" while fighting off waves of despair, or (c) read a pile of books on the floor. In the winter months, when you had an hour and a half to fill before the sun came up, this was tough duty. I know how this will sound to all the early risers out there, but this was some existential stuff. Anyway, most of the time, I took Option C, books. The problem is, you can read a lot of kid books in an hour, and if you choose wrong -- if you get pushed into the wrong groove -- you can be in for a world of hurt. In particular, I remember struggling through Amelia Bedelia and a series of Backyardigans books -- really, any TV show spinoff was a serious soul-killer. Cutesy books, with cutesy alliterative characters -- Randy the Rooster, Francie the Fairything, Harry the... Holy Momma, those were some dark days. But they were also some good days. Because really, when you locked in on the good ones, and Abby would sit there in your lap for an hour, turning pages and listening to you read: you'd have to have a stone for a heart to complain about that. And as for what qualified as good, in the pitch dark, before coffee? The books that made us laugh (thank you,
Early Mornings with Abby (and William Steig)
Early Mornings with Abby (and William Steig)
Early Mornings with Abby (and William Steig)
For the first four, maybe five, years of Abby's life, she would wake up at 5:45 in the morning, leap out of bed, throw her door open and sprint down the hall -- bump, bump, bump, bump, bump -- and into our bedroom. Depending on who was on Morning Duty that day, Jenny or I would hoist ourselves out of bed, take Abby by the hand, and stagger back to her room to (a) organize her Playmobil farm, (b) play Dora "Chutes and Ladders" while fighting off waves of despair, or (c) read a pile of books on the floor. In the winter months, when you had an hour and a half to fill before the sun came up, this was tough duty. I know how this will sound to all the early risers out there, but this was some existential stuff. Anyway, most of the time, I took Option C, books. The problem is, you can read a lot of kid books in an hour, and if you choose wrong -- if you get pushed into the wrong groove -- you can be in for a world of hurt. In particular, I remember struggling through Amelia Bedelia and a series of Backyardigans books -- really, any TV show spinoff was a serious soul-killer. Cutesy books, with cutesy alliterative characters -- Randy the Rooster, Francie the Fairything, Harry the... Holy Momma, those were some dark days. But they were also some good days. Because really, when you locked in on the good ones, and Abby would sit there in your lap for an hour, turning pages and listening to you read: you'd have to have a stone for a heart to complain about that. And as for what qualified as good, in the pitch dark, before coffee? The books that made us laugh (thank you,