Penny Colman

Road Trip

2009-06-30T21:40:00.012-04:00

Back from our road trip north to Quebec, east to Tadoussac, ferry boat across the wide St. Lawrence River, south through New Brunswick & Maine, west across Massachusetts, south through Connecticut, New York, home--quick summary: discovered 3 terrific used book stores; went whale watching & saw porpoises, harbor seals, minke whales and many beluga whales; long walks through beautiful forests (but, oh, so many black flies that inflicted serious damage!!)--the muffins I made (previous post) saved us several times, including the night we ended up eating muffins, a banana, cheese & crackers for dinner.
Returned late last night, up early to begin teaching a nonfiction literature class at Queens College. The pics are the front & back of a beluga whale t-shirt I bought for Sophie at the The Center d'interpretation des manniferes marins (Center for Interpretation of Marine Mammals)in Tadoussac. Quebec, of course, is French speaking so the five behaviors pictured on the back are in French, which Marilou, the super attentive guide translated as: (top to bottom, l to r) porpoising, birthing, tail flapping, eye-spying, nursing, feeding. The artist is Frederick Bach. Check out the center at http://www.gremm.org
Note: the URL will take you to a page where you'll need to click on that URL again.)

Adventures

2009-06-22T22:03:00.002-04:00

We're off tomorrow on a road trip to Canada, one stop is Tadoussac, where the beluga whales breed in the summer. I'm psyched! I made banana-oatmeal-honey- pecan muffins to sustain us.
This is Sophie's last week of school; (the following week she leaves with her mother to spend six weeks with her Swiss relatives in Zurich, with side trips to Mallorca, Monstein, & Milan--very cool!) Instead of our usual Thursday, I picked her up today at school.
As we walked out, holding hands, I said, "Hey Sophie, this is the last time I'll pick you up at kindergarten."
"But you'll pick me up at first grade," she said with a slight question mark in her voice.
"Absolutely," I replied.
She wanted to see her garden so we headed to Englewood. After surveying it, she suggested we expand it, i.e. dig up more yard. Since I love to dig, I ordinarily would agree, but the ground is toooooo soggy! So we played inside board games (by the game rules, not Sophie rules). Then we played "ticket," which basically involves Sophie using my stack of post-its etc. to write ticket to admit me to various events.
"Who are you bringing with you?" she asked.
"Three girls and a cat," I replied.
"No cats," she said. "How old are you?" "Do you have a Blackberry?" etc.

I Wrote A Book Today

2009-06-17T19:19:00.003-04:00

"I wrote a book today," Sophie announced from her car seat.
"Tell me about it," I replied.
"The title is My Mommy, she said. "The story is--'I love you, but who is my Mommy? This is my Mommy.'"
"I like that," I said. "Did you draw a picture of your Mommy?"
"No, Grammie," she exclaimed. "It's about a baby tiger!"
Oooops, I thought--of course, Sophie-the-animal-lover! Curious, I asked how she went about writing the story.
"I took a piece of paper and folded it in the middle. The title is on the outside. The story is on the inside. I wrote one long sentence--'I love you, but who is my Mommy?' Then a short sentence--'This is my Mommy.' I made the baby tiger say in a bubble, 'Who is my Mommy?'"
"You mean a speech bubble?" I asked.
"Yes, a speech bubble."

Nonfiction Summer Reading List from P.S. 174

2009-06-15T18:12:00.004-04:00

Students in Marie Russell's 6th grade class at P.S. 174 in Queens put together this summer reading list of nonfiction books in response to my post about the absence of nonfiction books on lists (see May 30, 2009).
Marie e-mailed it to me with this message: "As promised, here is a list that my students put together of titles they recommend. We also read as a class the following and even though they weren't that eager to read them, in the end they rated them very highly. Of Beetles and Angels by Mawi Asgedom, Dave Berger, eds. and Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World: The Extraordinary True Story of the Shakleton Expedition by Jennifer Armstrong. All of these books were part of a grant that our school library received and we were the first class to look at the books." Click on the list for a larger image.
Thank you to Marie Russell and her terrific students!

My Great Story! from NDSS

2009-06-12T10:51:00.007-04:00

Check out My Great Story, a new public awareness campaign launched by the National Down Syndrome Society (NDSS). Fascinating & truly inspiring great stories of the 400,000 Americans living with Down syndrome are showcased in a beautiful online storybook at www.ndss.org/stories. I'm thrilled to share news of this exciting & worthwhile venture on my blog (and not just because my son, Jonathan, is president of NDSS)--these are electrifying stories!

Two great stories will soon appear as national public service announcements (PSAs): Sujeet Desai, The Traveler and Sara Wolff, The Public Speaker (see pics). Anyone who loves stories--and we all do!!--will loved these!! Check them out at www.ndss.org/stories & watch for them in national media outlets.

Also teachers --the My Great Story website is a terrific online resource for teaching community, diversity, character education, writing, social issues, etc. etc. Check it out: www.ndss.org/stories

If you have Down syndrome, NDSS wants to hear your great story; or, if you have a great story about someone you know who has Down syndrome, NDSS wants to hear from you. You can contact them through: www.ndss.org/stories.

Quite the road trip!

2009-06-09T21:46:00.011-04:00

One hundred years ago today--June 9, 1909, twenty-two- year- old Alice Ramsey, with her two sisters-in-law and a friend, set off from New York CIty to drive across America in a Maxwell DA. Fifty-nine days later (41 actual driving days), after many hair-raising adventures, they arrived in San Francisco, where cheering crowds welcomed them. Thus, as the only driver, Alice earned the title of the first woman to complete the transcontinental trip. Today Emily Anderson with Christi Catania to help navigate, and a rotating list of two additional passengers set off to re-create Alice's historic trip in a Maxwell DA that Emily and her father have rebuilt from scratch. Linda and I cheered them on from the side of the road in Wappinger Falls, NY, then followed them to Poughkeepsie for a reception at Vassar College, Alice's alma mater. Fabulous experience!! You can learn more and follow their adventure (via map, blog, Twitter) at www.aliceramsey.org. The top picture is Emily holding her four-month old daughter, who along with her grandmother, is on the trip, too. (They ride in a car that follows the Maxwell DA.) The smiling woman at the right is Catharine Bond Hill, the president of Vassar. The bottom picture is me talking with Charlie MacDonald, an antique car buff, who waited for hours to see Emily drive by. We're standing by his 1936 Buick; the antique car community, I discovered, is quite interested in this trip and the Anderson's rebuilt Maxwell DA. The video is of their departure from Vassar.
For more information, to follow their progress, blog, Twitter go to: www.aliceramsey.org

Read Aloud

2009-06-09T09:29:00.005-04:00

Linda's 9-month old granddaughter is staying with us for a few days next week while her mother and father tend to work obligations. Since our children's book collection has aged up with Sophie, I just bought Mem Fox's new book, "Hello Baby." In the process, I discovered her web site & highly recommend it, in particular, check out her pages on "How To Read Aloud" and "See and Hear Mem." I'm going to be using both in the two classes that I'm teaching this summer. Here's the link:
www.memfox.net

Pasta with red sauce

2009-06-03T10:11:00.006-04:00

Sophie & her parents moved yesterday; six streets north and about 1/4 mile east to a larger place. She spent the night at our house, which meant getting up very early to get her to school in the city by 8 a.m. She's not a breakfast eater, except when I make her pancakes. But when the radio announcer said that traffic was backing up on the George Washington Bridge due to an accident, I decided there's wasn't time for pancakes; instead I followed her mother's recommendation to take a bag of Cherrios for her to eat in the car.
I handed her the Cherrios, but no luck. In my typical information-conveying style, I started telling her true stories, hoping to motivate her to eat. First, about how when I was on the NJ Commission on Hunger we did research to find out whether or not breakfast was important for school children & discovered that it is!
Sophie was interested but unmoved so I told her two more totally true stories, hoping to what?--I'm not sure. Anyhow, I confessed that a long time ago when I was a kid, I didn't like breakfast until one morning my grandmother offered me a cold hamburger, which I ate with gusto (a fun-to-say-word, Sophie said). Then there was the case of who-is-going-to-eat-the-trout: during my early teenage years, I spent two weeks in the summer with my grandparents, who lived in New Hampshire. Gramp & I we liked to go fly fishing for trout, until Grammie said we couldn't go anymore unless someone starting eating the trout that were piling up in the freezer. (Knowing that Sophie is a passionate animal lover, I interrupted my narrative to tell her that nowadays many fishers catch and release fish.)
Gramp refused; I agreed & ate trout every morning for the two weeks of my stay!
I ended my storytelling with a tidbit about how when Linda's son Jeremy was in kindergarten he said he'd only eat soup for breakfast.
Then I said (naming Sophie's favorite food), "I wonder--would you have eaten pasta with red sauce for breakfast this morning?"
"Yes," she enthusiastically answered.
"Ok, next time," I replied.
"But, I also like pancakes."

Summer Reading Lists

2009-05-30T08:22:00.011-04:00

Because we subscribe to The New York Times we get part of the Sunday paper on Saturday, including The Book Review. That's why this morning, while drinking coffee and eating Silver Palate's thick and rough oatmeal with pump juicy raisins, I know that the issue dated 5/31/09 is devoted to "Summer Readings." I counted the titles and found 15 fiction books, including 2 for children and 62--yup, sixty-two--nonfiction books, including 10 about cooking, 12 about gardening, 6 about travel and 4 about music, plus there was a nonfiction essay.
That ratio of fiction to nonfiction books, however, will be flipped, on the 2009 summer reading lists that teachers and librarians compile for children & young adults; in fact, in my experience, many--if not most--of those summer reading lists will have no, or only a few nonfiction books, or list books as nonfiction that aren't like the Magic School Bus.
Let's challenge the hegemony of fiction on summer reading lists for children and young adults & compile a list of nonfiction books; please send me your recommendations! Thank you!
p.s. (For more about the importance of nonfiction, check my podcast, "The Potential of Nonfiction," on my website.)

Author visit

2009-05-19T14:33:00.013-04:00

I am about to do a Q & A with eight middle school girls at Saint Andrew's School in Boca Raton, FL via Skype. My long time friend Dot Emer (Dot Chastney in Rosie the Riveter: Women Working on the Home Front in World War II) is the middle school librarian at Saint Andrew's. This is a first for the girls & the school. But we're all prepared--the technology is OK, the girls read some of my books, reviewed my web site, including examples of Q & A & I "talked" with two of the girls yesterday in a trail run. Ooops, better sign off & turn on my Skype or I won't be "show up" on time!
Update:

This picture was posted on the Saint Andrew's web site shortly after our fun Skype conversation. Here is an excerpt from the accompanying article: "On May 19, 6th and 7th grade students gathered in the Schmitt Library in the Middle School to skype online with acclaimed author Penny Colman, who was in Englewood, New Jersey. Each student was able to get behind the Web cam to ask Penny for advice on the writing process and about her professional career as an author. . . . Using Skype as an Internet connectivity in the classroom provides opportunities for interactive exchange and collaboration between students and the outside world. These synchronous, real-time discussions using VOIP software like Skype can tangibly expand the walls of the traditional classroom and engage students to write, share, and communicate with an authentic audience inaccessible just a few years ago." (Picture/article posted at: www.saintandrews.net & click on "Middle School Skypes with Author Penny Colman"/click on this pic for larger image.)

2009-05-18T13:36:00.003-04:00

Saturday & Sunday--We finally managed two days & overnights at our bungalow at the Jersey Shore; unlike many people we typically go year round--I kayak into December--but this year our work pressures have been toooo intense to spend time there. Plus Stirring Up the World: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, a Biography of a Powerful Friendship was too big a writing project to do there, i.e., not enough room for all my research material, no wireless internet connection, etc.
The days were sunless, but peaceful with few other intrepid people & Linda finally had the time to finish reading my manuscript. Getting to "know" Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony through my writing, she said, was a "deeply emotional experience." That was what I discovered too; so what a wonderful response to receive from her, my relentlessly perfectionist critic.

This evening my son Jonathan, a singer-songwriter, also president of the National Down Syndrome Society, is performing at a club in New York City. Another son David, a professor of African American history, is talking about his book Race Against Liberalism: Black Workers and the UAW in Detroit at the Englewood Library. We've gone to two of Jonathan's fabulous performances, plus he said tonight is for a "young" crowd, so we don't have to flip a coin to decide where to be--we'll go to hear David!

Eventful Day

2009-05-14T22:28:00.006-04:00

This morning I spoke on "Celebrating Women," at the 18th Annual Women Veterans Health Conference at the VA Hospital in Brooklyn. Here a picture of one of the veterans showing me her portfolio of amazing art work--wood carvings, paintings, sculptures. I have a video of our conversation that I'll post later. Thank you to Catherine Nadal, Women's Veterans Program Manager, who invited me to speak. (click on pic for larger image)
Afterwards I drove to a section of Brooklyn that's been on my list of "women's history site to visit" for a long time--Gravesend, a permanent colonial settlement founded by a woman--Lady Deborah Moody in 1645(the date the Dutch granted her the town patent). A religious dissenter, Lady Moody had been dubbed a "dangerous woeman" by the Puritan leaders in Massachusetts, who had expelled her. In the town she founded, people were granted religious freedom and women could vote. From there I drove home, change clothes and returned to NYC to picked up Sophie. I'm driving, she's telling me about school, when suddenly she says: "Grammy, I remember when your hair was brown."

Rosy Red Nose

2009-05-11T12:38:00.004-04:00

Sophie was waiting for me to put on my shoes so that we could go out for pizza. She had a page of stickers & we were joking about something--I don't remember what--when she spontaneously stuck one on end of my nose.
What's that?
A red star.
What will people think at the pizza store?
They'll think you're a writer.
Really?
Yes, writers look like that.
They do?
Let's pretend you're a poet and you want to imagine yourself:
Look at my
rosy red
nose with a
bright
star on it.

Award

2009-05-05T12:02:00.013-04:00

Last night I was thrilled to be honored as a 2009 Woman of Achievement by the New Jersey State Federation of Women's Clubs of General Federation of Women's Clubs and Douglass College of Rutgers, the State University. It was a glorious event and experience!!! Thank you to Anne H. Redlus, President of NJSFWC and all the members!!!!! The pictures L-R (click on pic for larger image): me giving my thank-you speech; Joint Legislative Resolution of commendation and congratulations from the Senate and General Assembly of New Jersey; Certificate of Recognition from NJSFWC

What a Concert

2009-05-04T10:02:00.008-04:00

Yesterday morning, Linda came home from the bagel store with the news of a 5:00 p.m. concert at Madison Square Garden in honor of Pete Seeger's 90th birthday; a once-in-a-lifetime concert, she said, sad that we would miss it. But we didn't, I got tickets & there we were--4 1/2 hours of music performed by, among many others--Joan Baez, Billy Bragg, Ani DiFranco, Arlo Guthrie, Emmylou Harris, Richie Havens, Dave Matthews, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Toshi Reagon, and Bruce Springsteen. The crowd greeted Bruce with a chant we couldn't deciper & that prompted the woman sitting next to Linda to worry that he was being booed. "What are they saying?" I asked the young woman next to me. In a flash, the boy and his father, from Austin, Texas, who were sitting in front of me, spun around to say in their twang, "Bruuuuuuuuce, they're saying Bruuuuuuuuuce."

We all did lots of singing & the concert ended with Peggy Seeger, Pete's half-sister and a renown folk singer, getting the entire ensemble (everyone packed on stage) plus the audience to sing "Irene Goodnight." Very coooool evening!
p.s. At point, I politely asked a group of Madison Square Garden bouncer-like ushers who were loudly chattering to "please, keep it down." "Lady, you're at a concert, not the opera," a tough looking guy snarled back. FYI: No, I was not dressed for the opera! Yes, they quieted down.

Libraries and Bookstores

2009-04-30T21:48:00.003-04:00

Where: My car
When: Just picked up Sophie
What: Deciding what to do during our time together

Note: it was "poem in a pocket day"
Me: I have a poem in my pocket for you.
Sophie: I have a poem in my backpack.
We read our poems and then talked about what to do together:
Me: We could go to the zoo, a museum, a park, playground, library, bookstore. . . .
Sophie: A library and bookstore are different!
Me: "That's interesting--tell me more."
Sophie: "In a library you have to be quiet. Someone shows you a book and you decide if you want to take it home but you can't keep it. In a bookstore you get to pick out what you like and take it with you and keep it."
Me: You mean you can keep it after you pay for it at the bookstore.
Sophie: Yes, but you can return it if you want to, like sometimes we have to return clothes."

p.s. we went to a woodland park with climbing equipment. Sophie is happy to share my enthusiasm as I point out all the things my mother pointed out to me, oh, so many years ago--skunk cabbage, violets and dog-tooth violets, may apples, etc.

Mother's Day

2009-04-30T14:19:00.002-04:00

I cut and pasted this from the National Women's History Project. For more information, check out: www.nwhp.org
History of Mother's Day
Given the following possibilities, how many of us could pick the right answer?
Mother's Day began:
* In 1858, when Anna Jarvis, a young Appalachian homemaker, organized "Mother's Work Days" to improve the sanitation and avert deaths from disease-bearing insects and seepage of polluted water.
* In 1872, when Boston poet, pacifist and women's suffragist Julia Ward Howe established a special day for mothers --and for peace-- not long after the bloody Franco-Prussian War.
* In 1905, when Anna Jarvis died, her daughter, also named Anna, decided to memorialize her mother's lifelong activism, and began a campaign that culminated in 1914 when Congress passed a Mother's Day resolution.
The correct answer: All of the above. Each woman and all of these events have contributed to the present occasion now celebrated on the second Sunday in May.
The cause of world peace was the impetus for Julia Ward Howe's establishment, over a century ago, of a special day for mothers. Following unsuccessful efforts to pull together an international pacifist conference after the Franco-Prussian War, Howe began to think of a global appeal to women.
"While the war was still in progress," she wrote, she keenly felt the "cruel and unnecessary character of the contest." She believed, as any woman might, that it could have been settled without bloodshed. And, she wondered, "Why do not the mothers of mankind interfere in these matters to prevent the waste of that human life of which they alone bear and know the cost?"
Howe's version of Mother's Day, which served as an occasion for advocating peace, was held successfully in Boston and elsewhere for several years, but eventually lost popularity and disappeared from public notice in the years preceding World War I.
For Anna Jarvis, also known as "Mother Jarvis," community improvement by mothers was only a beginning. Throughout the Civil War she organized women's brigades, asking her workers to do all they could without regard for which side their men had chosen. And, in 1868, she took the initiative to heal the bitter rifts between her Confederate and Union neighbors.
The younger Anna Jarvis was only twelve years old in 1878 when she listened to her mother teach a Sunday school lesson on mothers in the Bible. "I hope and pray that someone, sometime, will found a memorial mother's day," the senior Jarvis said. "There are many days for men, but none for mothers."
Following her mother's death, Anna Jarvis embarked on a remarkable campaign. She poured out a constant stream of letters to men of prominence -- President William Taft and former President Theodore Roosevelt among them -- and enlisted considerable help from Philadelphia merchant John Wannamaker. By May of 1907, a Mother's Day service had been arranged on the second Sunday in May at the Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia, where Mother Jarvis had taught. That same day a special service was held at the Wannamaker Auditorium in Philadelphia, which could seat no more than a third of the 15,000 people who showed up.
The custom spread to churches in 45 states and in Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Mexico and Canada. The Governor of West Virginia proclaimed Mother's Day in 1912; Pennsylvania's governor in 1913 did the same. The following year saw the Congressional Resolution, which was promptly signed by President Woodrow Wilson.
Mother's Day has endured. It serves now, as it originally did, to recognize the contributions of women. Mother's Day, like the job of "mothering," is varied and diverse. Perhaps that's only appropriate for a day honoring the multiple ways women find to nurture their families, and the ways in which so many have nurtured their communities, their countries, and the larger world.

Sophie & Yankee Doodle

2009-04-27T11:17:00.003-04:00

Where & When: my car, last week
What: singing all the verses of "Yankee Doodle"
Why: the kindergarten kids are singing it as part of a show

I'm navigating traffic & half listening to the lyrics, which I don't really remember 'cept for the part about riding on a pony and sticking "a feather in his hat" and calling " it macaroni." I hear Sophie sing something about girls being "handy." Then she stops and says, "Grammy, girls certainly are handy."
"What? What do you mean?" I reply.
"When the boys carry the tables, sometimes they need the girls to put their hands under the table and help them."
"The boys carry the tables? Why?"
"Because they are strong."
"But, so are you, Sophie. You are really strong. Think about how you just climbed the climbing wall and ran very fast."

This morning I was repeating this dialogue to Linda, who just returned from speaking at a conference in Mallorca, & commenting about gender socialization when she interrupted me to say, "The lyrics are 'and with the girls be handy.''"
Oh! Oh, well, on the one hand, neither Sophie or I understood that; but on the other hand, now that I "got it" she undoubtedly will too before too long.

Sophie, Birds' Nests and Books

2009-04-23T23:34:00.011-04:00

I picked up Sophie today. Before driving, I gave her a snack. While she ate, we sat together in the backseat & I showed her the pictures I took to document what her birds' nests look like on day 2, and day 3. First I showed her the photo I took the day she made the nests (see previous post), then the day 2 photo. Quickly pointing to the empty dish, she said, "They ate the food!"
When I showed her day 3. She was silent, then said: "The birds came." "What do you think they did?' I asked. "Danced," she replied. "Made a cape," she said gesturing to her shoulders. "And a skirt," she added, dropping her hands to her hips.
I told her we had brought the towels in the house because it was going to rain. "Do you think that was a good idea?" "No, because the birds came," she replied. "Should I put them back?" "Yes, but you don't need to put the dishes back."
I took the third picture at Acorn, a wonderful independent book story. Sophie asked for a book on how to draw animals. "We have several," the bookseller said. "Come I'll show you."
As you can see--she did!!! Very cool experience!!!!!
During our time together, we were stopped at a red light, when I heard her say in a reflective voice, "The white goes well with the blue." I figured the white was a blossoming spring tree. But what was the "blue." I glanced back & saw the white tree, just as Sophie added, "the blue sky."
day 2

day 3

SBA

2009-04-19T23:01:00.003-04:00

Susan "died" at 10:46 p.m. I ended the story of their friendship at 10:55 p.m. About then, I heard Linda come downstairs. She smelled something--oops, I forgot I had turned on the tea kettle--didn't even hear the whistle.
She comes to the basement. I look up:
"I just finished. Do you want to hear it?"
"Yes."
"Perfect," she said. "It's moving & perfect."

As for the ruined tea kettle, she said-- "small price to pay to finish a book."

Writing books is a miraculous process--it's so hard & then so easy, or so it seems.

ECS

2009-04-19T20:08:00.003-04:00

As if she had just died now, I noted what time it was when I wrote the sentence "Two weeks before Elizabeth’s birthday, Harriot sent a telegram to Susan with the news: 'Mother passed away at three o’clock.'”
For the record I wrote that at: 8:08 p.m., April 19, 2009, page 266 of my manuscript Stirring Up the World: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, a Biography of a Powerful Friendship. I'm teary eyed; writing biographies is an intense experience. Now to write about Susan's reaction. First, I should go upstairs and tell Linda.

End stretch

2009-04-18T11:17:00.004-04:00

I'm pressing onward to finish Stirring Up The World: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, a Biography of a Powerful Friendship. My editor is waiting. Spring break is over, back to teaching 3 classes at Queens next week, plus a author visit at a school on Friday, etc. Yikes! I'm close, but I think torn between the pressure of needing to get to the end of their friendship and not wanting to have them die! My music for this end stretch is Beethoven's piano concertos--over and over they play. Right now I'm struggling with a section I wrote last night & realllllly like, but in the light of day I think it slows down the narrative---plus I can't go forward & that always means I have to unravel until I can.

Sophie's Experiment

2009-04-16T20:36:00.005-04:00

Sophie & I were working in the garden. (We both love gardening, in particular digging holes.) A cardinal was singing and singing.
"Grammy, wouldn't it be a good idea to make a nest for the birds?"
"Well, that's an interesting idea." Briefly I considered pointing out that we don't get birds that nest on the ground, but I was tired and she was so enthusiastic, her imagination was in high gear.
"We could dig a hole, put soft things in it. . ."
"Well, yes, I guess we could start collecting things," I replied. (Yes, it was an attempt to stall.)
"We could use a towel," she said & dashed off to the house.
She returned with a hand towel & asked me if that was OK to use. "Yes," I absentmindedly replied and went in to make dinner. As I left, she said, "We need to leave food for the birds. Do you have bird seed?"
"No, it's gone, but I'll look for something else."
In a few minutes, she was in the kitchen asking for the food. I got some bread crumbs.
"Do you want to sprinkle some on or put them in a dish?"
"A dish."
Out she went with a half-filled glass custard dish.
While I cooked, she made a second nest with another dish of food.
She ate & then I drove her home. On the way, she said, "Grammy, tomorrow, don't forget to check the nest to see if the bird is there."
"Ok"
"Check everyday. You can make a chart."
"Ok"
"Check the food too. Even if the bird isn't there, it might eat the food. You can put that on the chart too."
Ok.
I returned home & went back to writing Stirring. When Linda arrived, I told her the story. She figured that Sophie must had gotten the good guest hand towels from the downstairs bathroom (because Linda put them there for our weekend guests). We went out to look. The sight was so sweet--the "nests," each with a dish of food, carefully arranged side-by-side between the daffodils and hyacinths. "Let's leave it. We can wash the towels," Linda said. "Yes," I replied. "Besides I have to make a chart."

Sophie's Observation

2009-04-16T18:57:00.002-04:00

What: Snippet from our conversation
Where: My car
When: Driving Sophie home this evening

Sophie: I passed my swimming test. I moved to a different level.

Me: Wow, that’s great.

Sophie: Now I have a boy teacher in the deeper end. All the boy teachers are in the deep end. The girl teachers are in the shallow end. But that’s not fair.

Me: Why isn't it fair?

Sophie: Because what if a boy teacher likes little kids and wants to teach them in the shallow end?

Me: Oh, that's a good point. Did you talk to someone about that?

Sophie: Yes, Scott (her boy teacher) said he likes to teach big and little kids and they’re going to make another pool . . . (Sophie continued with the explanation but I got distracted navigating the traffic on the George Washington Bridge & couldn't track it.)

p.s. No, I've never done that type of gender analysis i.e. "all the boys teachers are in the deep end. . ." with Sophie.

Sophie, Bee-Eaters & Writing

2009-04-10T13:21:00.008-04:00

We spent yesterday at the Bronx Zoo. Here are pictures and a brief video of the zoo biologist feeding crickets to the White-Throated-Bee-Eaters, birds that lives free in East Africa. L to R: Sophie (with pigtails) watching the biologist reach into a plastic bag full of live crickets. Bee-Eaters on branches. They catch a cricket mid-flight and then "smack" it on a branch to make it easier to eat. The"cliff" is where they build nests (last year they produced 9 fledglings). In captivity, the birds eat "cat chow" (you're not hearing things in the video; that's what she says), softened with water, enriched with calcium. The cricket feeding activity, she explained, is for "fun," i.e., to keep the birds from "getting bored." When the weather gets warmer, she collects bees from the hives that are on the top of the building (The World of Birds) and releases them for the birds to chase and consume. The exhibit is open, i.e., above the railing in the first picture (the birds stay put because of the branches, "cliff", and food), except when the bees are released. Then a curtain is drawn to keep the bees from escaping. The "smacking" ejects the toxin and stinger from the bees.
Later while we were eating dinner, I asked Sophie what she liked about writing:
"Using my imagination," she replied, rolling her eyes. "Looking in my brain."
"Imagination is interesting," I said. "You can use it to make up things to write or you can use it to remember something that really happened to write about. That's what I mostly write about--things that really happened."
As an example, I suggested, we use our imagination to describe the White-Throated Bee-Eaters.
"Their beaks are like bananas," she said.