Kennedy: The charms of bedtime reading

Luis Soriano lies down on the floor as he reads to Magdalen Bruce, 6, Jacqueline Garcia, 7, Luis Garcia, 6, and Miguel Gonzalez, 6, Monday, Oct. 23, 2017, at East Lake Elementary School in Chattanooga, Tenn. Soriano visited East Lake Monday where he read a book that was written about him and gave a presentation about his "Biblioburro" mobile library project.
Luis Soriano lies down on the floor as he reads to Magdalen Bruce, 6, Jacqueline Garcia, 7, Luis Garcia, 6, and Miguel Gonzalez, 6, Monday, Oct. 23, 2017, at East Lake Elementary School in Chattanooga, Tenn. Soriano visited East Lake Monday where he read a book that was written about him and gave a presentation about his "Biblioburro" mobile library project.

As your children get older, you begin to hold tight to small rituals.

For the last 16-plus years, bedtime reading has been one of our household's nightly habits. Sometimes fatigue overtakes us all and we punk out. But most nights we curl up with a book, a boy and a fluffy little dog at our feet.

Thankfully, our 11-year-old's elementary school requires children to turn in a monthly reading calendar, with their daily readings carefully logged by time and title. It's a chore that becomes a habit - and eventually a gift.

Our older son, now 16, has cultivated the reading habit. Over the holidays, he would disappear into his room with the latest title in his favorite book series. Anything that allows his Xbox and iPad to cool down to room temperature is OK by me.

Falling under the spell of a book is one of life's genuine pleasures. Think of it as a gift with a lifetime warranty.

While reading with our fifth-grader one night this week, I realized that our nightly ritual will soon end. He will be off to middle school next year, and the reading log will go "poof."

Consequently, I've begun savoring our nightly reading time. It's our habit to read aloud, alternating pages to let our tongues rest.

This week we are reading a book called "Outcasts United," subtitled: "The Story of a Refugee Soccer Team That Changed a Town."

It's about a Jordanian woman who moved to a suburb of Atlanta to coach a soccer team made up of refugee children. It's a perfect book for our 11-year-old, who wears soccer jerseys as pajamas.

Some of the kids' journeys are described in the early chapters of the book. Last night, we read about a boy who survived a bloody civil war in Liberia. The night before, we learned about the coach's early life in Jordan and the wanderlust that drove her to seek a life in the United States.

When the topic of Jordan came up, I drew the outline of the Mediterranean sea in the air and pointed to the eastern edge where Israel and Jordan come together like conjoined twins.

"Remember Egypt from geography," I said. "Israel and Jordan are just to the northeast."

He nodded with his lips pursed, a sign he actually saw the correlation between our earlier map study and our bedtime reading.

Later, I thought about how far we'd come in 11 years, from "Go, Dog, Go," to Dr. Seuss, to Shel Silverstein, to funny chapter books about Fudge by Judy Blume, to discussions about Middle Eastern geography and Sharia law.

Oh, what a long, strange trip it's been.

My favorite children's book is "The Giving Tree" by Silverstein. It begins, "Once there was a tree and she loved a little boy."

On his path to manhood, the tree serves the boy as a sanctuary and playmate. Later, as the boy grows older, the tree is a source of income; offering its apples for sale in the market. When the boy-turned-man needs shelter, he cuts down limbs to build a house. When the Boy has a midlife crisis, he cuts down the tree and builds a boat.

In the final scene, the boy has become an old man and the tree is just a stump.

"Come, Boy, sit down," the tree beckons. "Sit down and rest."

And the boy does. And the tree is happy.

And that, in a nutshell, is parenthood.

Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645.

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