Once upon a time, we Neumanns were readers.
We read at bedtime every night for years. It was my favorite time of day, and I like to think it was the children’s, too. Then, at some point, the wheels fell off the routine and pretty much everything else, but that's another story....
Summer reading assignments, however, never have been popular with any of us.
One August, early in our elementary experience, we realized the first day of school was fast approaching and the reading log was not yet filled out. Plenty of books had been read, but nothing recorded.
"You have to fill this out," I remember saying, and Blake collected a pile of books, all with one- and two-word titles, so he wouldn't have to squeeze "From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler," or some such, onto the paper's too-tight grid: Title, Author, Date Completed.
"Your teacher wants to know about you," I told him. "She wants to know what you like to read. What will she learn about you from these?"
"That I like books with short titles," he said.
I told a wise and respected friend, and she confessed that she fills out the log for her children. "It's about the reading," she said. "It's not a handwriting assignment."
Ah-ha. It's about the reading.
This summer, the one ahead of eighth grade, Blake was to read two books, one from a choice of six or so, and the other from a choice of two. For the first, he chose one he'd read years before -- to make it easy on himself, and I couldn't make him do any differently, he said -- and, still, he was so uninterested in completing it that even dollar bills stuck with Scotch tape to our kitchen wall along with “30 minutes of summer reading" tickets went ignored.
After a few weeks, I pocketed back my money and he eventually slogged through the book, anyway.
The second book he picked from the two choices because -- go figure -- it had a short title: "Speak." But he let that one sit, too, so I started it myself.
It was about a girl who'd been sexually assaulted, and that's important subject matter, but for a 12-year-old now-reluctant reader? Ugh. Not this summer. I steered him toward the second book, Lois Lowry's "The Giver."
"I haven't read it, but I know it's popular," I told him.
"Why haven't you read it?" he asked.
"I think I heard it's sad," I told him, and he knows I don't read sad things on purpose.
"I'm not going to read it," he said.
"You have to."
"I don't. No one reads the summer assignment. It's optional."
"It's not."
"It is."
And so it went. For 58 years, or however long the summer break was.
We carried "The Giver" on vacation to Colorado.
"That's a really good book," said cousin Olivia.
"That's a really good book," said friend Christopher.
"I'm not reading it," said Blake, and he last-minute stashed it in the checked luggage on the way home, so it wasn't even an option on the flight.
"This book will be done if you want a ride to camp," I told him when we returned, 36 hours before sleepaway camp was to begin.
"I know you want me to go even more than I want to go, so I'm not reading it," he said.
He might've been right about that first part, but he at least started the book, and he got a lift to the dude ranch.
The best day of summer is sleepaway camp drop-off day. (Note to self: Sign up for an earlier session next year.)
The second-best is pickup day.
"Oh, hey, Mom," he said on the drive home, after he’d told me about his horse Hershey, his scaredy-cat counselors, and his eating nothing but Frosted Flakes all week “like the vegans.”
“Two kids in my cabin also had to read 'The Giver' this summer. I borrowed it when we were stuck inside when it rained. I only have 15 pages left. It's really, really good.
"Do you have my book with you?"
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