really...as boybarianish as my boys are, mostly i just see them as kids...
and then they start running around shouting professor poopypants! over and over and over and just laughing like there's no tomorrow...and i remember, oh yeah, i have boys...
last evening i took the duke to the library...he had joined their summer reading club a few weeks ago, and after completing 10 hours of reading, he got to pick a new, free book to keep...he was there to claim his book...so we look at the rack of books and what does he spy?
captain underpants
but of course...
captain underpants is just as you imagine it would be...he is a baby looking super hero in a red cape and nothing else but, you guessed it, underpants...tighty whities to be exact...it is a series of books, each of which is basically a vehicle for very childish and very bad toilet humor...toilet humor that is generally NOT allowed in our house...and thus far i have been able to steer us clear of these books at the library and bookstore...but, he did the reading and he earned the right to choose his book, and he chose what he wanted...
and in this particular series the next book is captain underpants and the perilous plot of professor poopypants...
sigh...
and i have a feeling that "professor poopypants" has created a porthole...the duke of fun is getting older, which means i need to get wiser...and like everything else associated with parenting since i gave birth seven years ago, i'm gonna have to find a way to bend so i don't break...
and that, my friends, is admittedly not very easy for me...always worth it, but rarely ever easy...
he got the book and read it in an hour...it's a pretty light read, long on the toilet jokes, short on everything else...
far be it for me to pass judgement on book choices, however...anyone who knows me well knows i LOVE to read...LOVE IT...can't imagine my life without it...my first *real book* was at age nine...dandelion wine by ray bradbury...siddhartha by herman hesse has served as my spiritual compass and all time favorite book since i first read it at seventeen...and for some reason, still unbeknownst to me, dharma bums by jack kerouac has become a reading staple for nearly 15 years now...it somehow reminds me of where i am *from* in life...there is something so familiar about the story, something that is impossible for me to name...
but back to the passing of judgement...of which i have no room because anyone who knows me well also knows i have a deep love of trash novels and a near obsession for people magazine and the like...and it's not just books...my dad said once i had a strong streak of trash running through me...and i took that as a compliment!...how else would i be able to love all those *great* books, and still love trash novels, budweiser beer, power ballads, and bad t.v...hell, i was devoted to dawson's creek until the bastards took it off the air...and still, every once in awhile, i get a sense that something is missing in my life...and i realize, it's the creek...i miss the creek...
now that the duke is reading well and often, he's making his own choices at the library and bookstore...i make suggestions, and point out series he might enjoy (he took to the boxcar children, which i LOVED as a child), but he makes the final choice...
i can hardly wait until he gets to the book that comes after "professor poopypants"...captain underpants and the wrath of the wicked wedgie woman...
we classical homeschool, and in the classical homeschooling community at large, the pervasive belief is that books like captain underpants are considered "fluff" or "junk food" reading...and like good nutrition, kids should fill themselves with "good" books...
and i agree...to a point...kids should be exposed to good books...in the form of read aloud and read alone...i believe that a diet that consists solely of junk food, like a reading diet that consists solely of "junk books", is not a well balanced diet...
but, there is a time and a place for junk...especially in the form of food and books...i can no more think of a gastronomical existence that didn't include the occasional maple bar or pile of hot salty fries, than i can imagine a literary existence that didn't include gossipy magazines and romance books with "piratical" (a real word if you can believe it) bad boys and standard plot formulas...
it's about comfort and release...a few moments away in a world that doesn't require you think too hard about it...a world that someone won't ask you to discuss when you are done with it...that just for those moments in that little book world, life is good, perhaps amusing, and it is simple...
because another one of the facets of classical homeschooling is the reading aloud by the parent of great works of fiction, ancient history, etc. to the pupil...and then the pupil narrarates back to the parent, in their own words, what the story, or passage was about...and while reading odysseus last fall to the duke was exciting for both of us, it's not exactly a book that inspires *release* or *simplicity*...
with summer upon us, and an hour and a half of free reading for the duke every day (it's his rest time, and he chooses to read), he's enjoying reading a myriad of books...and because i am me, even though we aren't in school i will still ask him about captain underpants and many of the other books he chooses...what he liked, didn't like, what's so funny, etc...not for a *narraration*, just because i'm curious...
and the look on his face when something he is reading is funny, and getting funnier, and then the loud explosion of giggles that follow, well it's just priceless...and i know that he's having a great time in the little world he's in...that right then, at that moment, life is really really good...
and it makes my bending and growing along with my boys a little easier, and more than worth it...
even if it means i have to listen to top of the lung shouts of "professor poopypants!" for the rest of the summer...
x.
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