Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Hooked on Reading

Not long after TVs were in nearly every home in America, the word was that reading would soon be obsolete. Later when computers took over the world, it was said books and newspapers would eventually disappear.
 
I don’t know what the future holds, but I will say people are still reading and writing. Bookstores are full of people buying books and talking about books. Book clubs abound. Kindles and Nooks are constant companions. Everywhere you look fingers are flying over keypads, texting. Somebody reads all those texts.

These days some parents are so eager for their little darlings to read they begin reading to them in utero. After thousands of hours reading to those babies and perhaps drilling them on phonics and sight words, mothers proudly present a reading kindergartener.

Not so with my mother. She had the weird notion that reading was best taught at school by teachers who knew what they were doing. When I entered first grade, no kindergarten in those ancient days, I didn’t even know my ABCs as my friend Kay did.

But Mama had prepared me well for school, not with reading and writing, but with talking. She had talked to me about the world I lived in. I could count money, tell time, and knew about everything I saw including the whys and hows.

My introduction to reading and writing was my long name the first grade teacher, Miss Perry, taped on my desk. It stretched all the way across the desk and was the first thing I learned to read.

Then Miss Perry placed a book, MAC AND MUFF, in front of me.  On the first page was a picture of a little, black Scottie, and under it was the word Mac, the Scottie’s name. Then I met Muff the cat and began to read, “Mac and Muff. See Mac run. See Muff run.”

I was hooked on reading. I wasn’t bothered with the sounds of letters, just the words and their meanings. The sight of Mac brought to mind a little, black Scottie.

Recognizing words at a glance was an easy way for me to learn reading. Before long I was reading everything or at least picking out words in the newspaper, on cereal boxes, and in the books I read to Mama. She didn’t read to me, but she was a good listener.

 I could hardly wait till Friday evenings when I could dig into Grandpa’s bag for the four books he brought me from the library every week. I was hooked on reading.

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Persistence of a Squirrel


                                                                                                                                                                             This morning I went out and discovered once again the persistence of a squirrel. Since early spring, squirrels have been digging all over my yard, in the beds, in the sod, in pots full of plants. In spite of my efforts to stymie the little rascals, they keep digging, maybe for nuts buried last fall or maybe just for the fun of it.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  After years of no squirrels at all, squirrel nests now abound in pecan trees next to my yard and behind it, and in a neighbor’s maple tree on the other side. Even two of my Foster hollies were marred with squirrel nests until Frank rigged a long pole and poked them out, raining leaves and nasty bits of debris on everything below.

Throughout the summer, squirrels kept digging holes, tossing aside plants, and leaving piles of displaced soil. We squirted them with blasts of water, chased them with a broom, and welcomed dogs and cats into the yard to run them out. All to no avail. A few weeks ago, anticipating their bright colors all winter, I planted pansies. The next morning half the pansies, with their bare roots shriveling in the sun, were lying beside squirrel holes. Every time I replanted them, squirrels unplanted them.

I don’t have a happy ending for this sad story. I’m still battling squirrels, even placed my baby succulents in a cage to thwart the rodents. But I have learned the meaning of persistence.

I’ve been told again and again a writer has to be persistent to find an agent. My new novel HAIRT BEFORE DAWN has undergone serious surgery and been reduced from a hefty 107,000 words to a lean, power-packed 90,000. After a number of rewrites and interest from several agents, it is now time for me to persist until I find the right one for me. I’m making my list and checking it more than twice. I will find an agent for I have developed the persistence of a squirrel.