Finding Joy in Snarkville

What an amazing word “ask” is. It is a word with power that reminds us all that should we need anything, we need only “ask.” I’ve known my whole life the importance of ‘asking,’ because often the sheer act of the asking is the hardest step in the process of ‘getting.’ Never in my 34 years thought that the little, three letter word ‘ask’ would have the power to change my life — yup, I’m feeling a little over-dramatic, why?

Recently, we’ve begun to watch some of the Electric Company shows from Prince and my youth. The earlier shows focus on sounding out words and putting together those sounds. Duke is fascinated.

We are also reading more basic books right now with attempts to get Duke to follow the words with his finger. I keep thinking that we are on the edge. The sparks are happening and I’m just waiting for the fire to win over.

Duke wants to know what everything says, he tries to make signs say what he thinks they should say. He wants to spell and feels strongly that he must know how to spell a word to ‘get it.’

So, last night, I’m snuggling with him while reading a book and we were searching for words. I kissed him on the forehead and whispered, “Duke, I love you so much. The next big hurdle in your life is to learn to read. I am looking forward to all the things we will get to read and do when that happens.” We hugged and kissed good night.

We went about our life. I sat down for a second while Duke was watching a little Electric Company this evening. The show announces, “The next word you will see will self-destruct in 5 seconds, see if you can read the word before it does.”

The word appears.

And I hear a little boy’s voice, softly and with effort say…..’AH-s-KA, ask.’

I know my son too well to jump up and give him the praise I felt on the inside. Too much attention would make this milestone fall apart. My boy is a quiet advancer, often progressing when no one is looking — he prefers the audience AFTER his trying is done and the doing has begun.

Instead, I nodded at Prince, confirming that neither of us had missed it.

We are on the brink. I shall go to sleep tonight dreaming of the day when Duke will read *ME* a story. I’m thinking we will begin with War & Peace so I can have it go along for as long as possible. Is that wrong?

More to the point, do I have to stop telling Duke that all the signs say “Duke must be quiet, and keep his hands in off the expensive stuff.”????

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 15th, 2008 at 12:16 am and is filed under Motherhood isn't for wimps. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.