In my last resource review, I mentioned my oldest was three when he memorized the story of David and Goliath. And it was from this Bible. The mental image of him in his toddler bed jutting out from the corner, the blond ringlets you could stick your finger through, the PJ’s that read “I heart Dad” with the matching striped pants.
“I am not afraid to fight the giant,” said David. King Saul called for David and told him, “You cannot fight the giant. You are too young.”
Some of the times I’ve felt most connected with my kids–since they were very, very small–have been enjoying books together. Grant it, this was often right before naptime. So there could have been good vibes all around. But there was something about their warm heads smelling of baby shampoo…and boy sweat. My kids sweat a lot. Maybe it’s because they were so rowdy that I loved this time when we were at last not moving or wiggling as much. My daughter was the only one who was much of a cuddler, so finally, we were feeling connected. At one point I calculated we were reading about 45 minutes a day.
And I know I’m not the only mom amazed by the steel trap that is a child’s mind. Before my son could read, he could “read” me, pretty much verbatim, the story of David and Goliath we’d read over. And over. And over in his children’s Bible.
Of all the vibrancy of being in another culture this week, one of my least favorite is the language barrier. It’s as if I’m constantly stopping myself from asking the questions I want to know of people–from relating.
The late neurosurgeon Paul Kalanithi, in his bestselling When Breath Becomes Air, writes of the two areas of speech in the brain:read more