Monthly Archives: August 2006

Etc., Librarianship, Storytime

The hardest thing

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Admit it, all of us have flaws – failings – things that we’re just not good at.  Most of us try to avoid situations where our failings are evident.  Why promote the negative, after all?  Much better to stick to the stuff you’re good at.

So when I talked to Mieke, my best friend from college, a while back and told her that my new job requires me to regularly sing in public, her response was, “Oh, my God, Abs.  Are you kidding?  Those poor people!”  Mieke, of course, has a fabulous voice, and sang all the time in college.  I, of course, have a horrible voice, and sang rarely.

But now I find myself needing to sing as part of my job.  In front of people.  Not just small children, but also their parents, some of whom can carry a tune very well.  And there’s really no way around it.  Story times for young kids need to have books AND fingerplays AND songs; it’s the way kids learn the rhythm of the language, which eventually helps them with reading multi-syllabic words.  Sometimes I’ll break out the boombox and play a song or two from a CD, but there are still times that I have to sing, and it’s pretty painful.

I read Stephen Fry’s autobiography last summer, and one of his phrases really resonated with me.  Fry talks about how he can hear music perfectly in his head, but that he can’t reproduce it; he says that he’s “not tone deaf, but tone dumb.”  That’s exactly what I am, since all those intricacies of the music are so clear in my head, and my inability to voice that music is utterly frustrating to me.

But now that singing is part of my career, what do I do?  I’ll admit to using the “my voice sounds rough because my allergies are really bothering me today” excuse a lot.  On particularly perky days I’ll play the role of cheerleader and say “I want to hear everyone sing this time!”  So far I haven’t yet admitted to being tone dumb, but that time may come.  And I’ve been practicing a lot, singing in the shower after my musical husband leaves for work.  I think I’ve gotten “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” down, but I’m still flummoxed by “The More We Get Together.”  And ”Five Little Ducks” is way, way tough.

Wish me luck.  My singing is definitely a work-in-progress.

Etc., Young adult book review

The best day of the year

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Recently, my brother wrote about the worst day of the year: (link no longer available, my apologies).  Today, though, was the best day of the year: the first day of vacation.  I love my job, don’t get me wrong, but even so there’s something about the first day of vacation that just can’t be beat.

So, on this first vacation in a year, there was absolutely no way that I was going to clean the house, no matter how badly it needs it.  Instead, I cashed in two of my tutoring checks and went shopping.  Yup, I actually had cash in my pocket, and I fully intended to use it.  Jewelry seemed like a good bet, but I was open to other options.  I ambled through some of my favorite stores in Concord center – Perceptions, Artful Image, Lacoste Gallery, Concord Hand Designs, the Concord Shop, the American Indian gift store, and the store that sells cool furniture and odds and ends for your home (next to Salone Arte).  I saw so many pretty things, and was almost tempted many times.  But I kept thinking to myself, “I’ve already got a beautiful glass pitcher.  I don’t need another,” or, “I could live without that pair of earrings,” or, “the house is just too small for another set of candlesticks.”  I was trying hard, but nothing could prompt me to pull that cash out of my pocket.

I couldn’t have imagined this a year ago, when I was miserable in my job and life seemed a tad difficult, but I’m happy.  I don’t need to buy things.  Not even that great Steiff bear in the Toy Shop window.

My husband had left me off in Concord center while he dropped off his amps and equipment for a gig tomorrow, and we set our meeting place as the Concord Bookshop.  So I gave up on shopping and went to the book store to wait for my ride.  Jim was late, and I wandered the aisles looking at books.  Jodi Picoult, my friend Judy told me she’s really great, maybe I should buy that.  Hmmm, no, I can borrow that from the library.  Kira-Kira?  Judy recommended that, too.  Nah, there’s a fresh new copy at the library.  A blank book?  Got plenty.

And then I was in the young adult section.  The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak.  The dollars practically leaped out of my pocket.  I’ve been wanting to read this book for SO long, but haven’t wanted to take our library’s copy out of commission (and it just doesn’t seem fair to borrow another library’s copy).  This book has gotten phenomenal reviews, and its premise is totally unique: Death narrates the story of Liesel, a girl in Nazi Germany who steals books.
The Book Thief now lives on my coffee table, and so far I absolutely love it.  I also picked up a paperback copy of The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan, for the same reasons that I bought Zusak’s book.  I may have lost my ability to spend money on frivolous things, but certain books can still make my heart beat a little faster.  And no, I have no idea what the meaning is behind the thievery theme in these two books.  I just know that, because of them, the rest of my vacation is going to be as good as today was.

Librarianship, Library events

And in the end…

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…we ate cake and cookies and brownie cupcakes and got to visit with the town fire truck.
Yes, the end of summer reading is here, and the finale picnic was a LOT of fun.  The kids had a blast with the fire truck and all the fire truck’s accoutrements (hats and boots and coats), and we went through a huge amount of yummy desserts.  Rumor has it that some kids decided to forgo their proper lunch in order to have more room for dessert, but I take no responsibility for that!

So tomorrow is the very last day of summer reading, and I’ve already begun to put some of the summer stuff away.  By the close of the day tomorrow, there won’t be a trace of the summer reading program left in the children’s room, and we’ll all have to start turning our focus towards (gasp!) the school year.  I hope that everyone else has had as much fun this summer as I have; though a few months ago the organizing of the program seemed like a gargantuan task, now it’s just a collection of happy memories.  And, shockingly, I can’t wait ’til next year!  We’ll see what I can cook up for next summer…

Etc., Library events

Nanny McPhee

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Quick note on this movie, for those of you who haven’t seen it (and might not be inclined to try, even!).  It’s not the absolute best movie that I’ve ever seen, but it’s still pretty darn good.  Emma Thompson is great as the hideously scary Nanny McPhee, and Colin Firth is at his charming, cutest best as a baffled father of too many.  And that raucous brood of misbehaving children – too fun.  Not to forget Angela Lansbury as the rather despicable aunt; she’s shed that “Murder She Wrote” persona and is entertaining again.

The movie was a hit at last Wednesday’s movie night, and I spotted many of the grown-up women in the audience with tears in their eyes (me, too).

Children's book reviews, Children's literature, Picture book review

More new books

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Three more new books that I absolutely love:

The True Story of Stellina by Matteo Pericoli

This one has received rave reviews in many different journals, including Horn Book Magazine.  So I was expecting great things from this book, and it more than delivered.  It’s a very sweet, unsentimental tale of a baby finch in New York City that falls out of its nest and is taken in by a young woman, after she watches and waits for many hours for the finch’s mother to claim her baby.  The young woman and the finch live happily together in a NYC apartment, and eventually Matteo Pericoli and the young woman get married and the finch, Stellina, continues to live with the two of them.  Stellina lived to be eight, and Pericoli’s retelling of her life story is beautiful and touching.  His prose is spare and lovely, and his illustrations are absolutely gorgeous.  (I was very misty-eyed — runny mascara — when I finished reading this book at my desk in the library.)

The Art Book for Children by the folks at Phaidon Press

This isn’t a picture book (I’m cataloging it in the section of the library for third grade and up).  Art from many different eras and styles is represented in this book, and the authors do an amazing job discussing the background information on specific pieces of art, pointing out certain aspects of each piece of art, and then posing open-ended questions about that artwork.  I can see parents reading this along with their children, with ensuing lively discussions about art.  Wish I’d had a book like this as a kid…it wasn’t til my junior year of college that I knew how to look at art and feel confident in my own opinions about that art.

Built to Last: Building America’s Amazing Bridges, Dams, Tunnels, and Skyscrapers by George Sullivan

Admittedly, I haven’t spent as much time reading this book as I should, but my excuse is that it’s a fairly dense text and I have a LOT of books to process at the moment.  What I’ve seen and read, though, I like a lot.  This book is definitely intended for an older audience, probably fifth grade and up, and gives details about various construction projects throughout the US.  Being from the Boston area, I read the section devoted to the Central Artery (the infamous Big Dig project), and found the text well-written and the photographs informative.  At the beginning of each section, the main facts about the project are set apart for easy reference and comparison: cost, time to complete, etc.  In addition, there are boxes in each section with related interesting facts; in the Big Dig section, there is a discussion about a privy from the 1600’s that was uncovered in the course of the construction, and what was found in the privy (including an early bowling ball!).

These books, and many other new books, will be the books available for summer reading bookplates.  Any child who read more than 30 hours during the summer will be able to choose from these great new books and have a bookplate put into the chosen book with that child’s name and the total number of hours that child read over the summer.  Some kids have just reached 30 hours, others are aiming high and have already reached 120 hours.  I’m really impressed by their achievements, and I’m glad that I have a stock of such great books from them to choose from for this bookplate adventure!

Children's book reviews, Children's literature

The Owl Service

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My current book is The Owl Service by Alan Garner, the classic 1968 winner of the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Award.  Though I’m really enjoying the book now that I’m more than half-way through it, I have to admit that I’ve really struggled with the Welsh colloquialisms and the Welsh names of people and places and the allusions to Welsh myths.  We’ve placed this book in the juvenile section of the library, based upon its content, but I’m wondering now if it really belongs in the young adult section.  It would take a precocious fifth grader to wade through all the Welsh vocabulary and stick with the book long enough in order to get fully involved in the story.

Has anyone else out there read this book recently?  I’d love to hear your thoughts about the book, and about who is its actual reader.

(As a postscript, my summer reading time is currently 24 hours; looks like I’ll meet my goal of 30 hours by the end of summer reading, August 18th!)