I don't have much time -- or mental energy -- to write much of anything about my recent adventures as the St. Martin de Porres Primary School Librarian (official title), but in reeling back the last six weeks of school, three distinct moments come to mind. First: the afternoon that the back zipper of my ugly-teacher-uniform skirt was unzipped ... All the way. It just so happened that the one boy who decided to point out my ridiculous blunder is a clown and I wrote off his "but Miss, I can see your underwear!" as an attempt at a crass joke to get his buddies' attention. Not until I went home to change out of said ugly-teacher-uniform skirt that evening did I discover the truth and feel horribly embarrassed.
Second: the afternoon that a 13 year old girl -- a notorious trouble maker -- sat at the table with me in the library and finished all of her homework. Not only did she prove absolutely competent and capable in the three subject areas completed, but she guarded her studies with a wave -- or a swift side punch-- to any nosy youngins lingering over her shoulder trying to get a glimpse of this big-time bully adding and subtracting fractions, whizzing through the dictionary, and looking up "Columbus, Christopher" in the index of the "C" World Book Encyclopedia. It was marvelous; she is hilarious, and smart, and absolutely feisty. I have reason to believe that despite the whole irrational temper thing, she's really going places.
Third: The day I met Rydell, a six year old, cross-eyed, and simply adorable young boy who can't read a word or even recognize a letter of the alphabet. He doesn't know his teacher's name, or how to spell "Rydell," (I'm guessing phonetically on that one, as well as with "Jaslynica," "Franzita," "Nutricia/Julicia," and "Ionie." Oh, and there is a little girl named "Cheney" -- I thought that was HI-larious) but he sure tells a good story, usually better than the corn-crap these people are passing off as children's books these days. Rydell comes to the library every day, without fail, to peruse the four shelves of story books and pick out the perfect one to "read" at our kitchen-table-turned-library-desk in the center of the room amidst the chaos of, what I like to call, "the St. Martin's after-school indoor playground." Due to such circumstances, and my own selfishness to hear his small voice animate the pages before him, I have recently been offering the corner of my check-out desk for him to use as he "reads." The best narrations Rydell has given so far, I must say, are for the "I Spy" books. "But Mr. Yellow Ducky couldn't open the boat, because his gold key was lost in the bucket." There are no words.
