I know about it?
“Have my two helpers arrived to rescue me from this pile of unshelved books?” came a little-old-lady voice from around the corner.
Sarah took off. “Grace!”
“Sarah…and Franklin.” They stood together as I came into the room, Mrs. Boardman’s two hands pressed around Sarah’s one. “We’ll have to catch up as we work, dears. I’m afraid I am behind my time. Franklin…”
Mrs. Boardman gave me a crinkly old-lady smile. “I saved the folktales for you.”
I am very familiar with the Dewey decimal system and therefore did not need much direction. I managed to reshelve my entire stack, from the Grimm brothers to stories from
1001 Arabian Nights,
while Mrs. Boardman and Sarah worked side by side in nonfiction.
“Oh dear,
Extreme Bicycle Maneuvers,
” Mrs. Boardman chuckled, inserting her ruler between two books on the top shelf. Sarah Kervick pressed the book into place. “What will they think up next? Here’s
Surfing in CyberSpace.
That would be right…here, I believe.”
Sarah fit another book in the space Mrs. Boardman created with her ruler.
“Now, tell me how that lutz is coming….”
Mrs. Boardman had grown up in Norway, where people skated into town down frozen rivers, so she was very interested in Sarah’s skating activities. She even knew Debbi, Sarah’s skating coach, from church.
“Has Debbi taught you the Scandinavian stop? It was all the rage at the ’64 Olympics, you know.”
“Not yet, we just do the T and the L so far. She says I shouldn’t go too fast.”
I agreed with Debbi—when I could understand her Swedish accent—that Sarah should get a complete grounding in fundamentals before she attempted more difficult moves.
After we finished the shelving, Mrs. Boardman gave us a snack: Oreos for Sarah and Tree of Life organic garden vegetable crackers for me.
“And, Franklin, I have some very nice organic lemonade to go along with it.”
We sat there, eating over napkins and flipping through our favorite books. It was very peaceful.
Sarah looked up from one of the glossy skating books Mrs. Boardman had ordered for her through interlibrary loan.
“Remember when you used to read to me, Franklin? When you were teaching me?”
I nodded.
She sighed. “We should do that again sometime. You could read that story about Pandora that we got out of the library.”
“It was Gloria who said you should read it.” Long ago, when I’d hardly known Sarah, Gloria told me to show her the story of Pandora from Greek mythology. It was about a beautiful and curious girl who opens a box and lets all the evil things out into the world: sickness, hate, pain, jealousy, all of it. But she also frees the little winged creature called Hope, who gives heart to all who suffer.
“Well, I’ve been thinking about that story lately…,” Sarah said, drawing her finger across the table, “and I’m wondering this: How does she know where to go? Hope? With all the problems in the world, how does she choose?”
CHAPTER SIX
Filling in the Blanks
That evening, as I sat alone on my bed, tape measure in hand, I made a shocking discovery. My logbook, in which I’d recorded the varying lengths of my arms and legs on their mismatched journey to adulthood, was missing two entries. I had forgotten to measure for two straight days in a row! I needed no one to remind me that those days were gone forever.
Measuring my arms and legs was just a normal part of my day. I’d been doing it for years, ever since I noticed the different rates at which they grew. You see, despite an exhaustive search on the Internet, I had discovered no journal articles devoted to this subject. What if I had a rare and previously undiscovered growth deficiency? Could I be ushering in an age when asymmetrical children struggled with balance? Was all this due to my mother’s sinister love of the game “Airplane,” in which children are swung around and around by their developing limbs until their
“Have my two helpers arrived to rescue me from this pile of unshelved books?” came a little-old-lady voice from around the corner.
Sarah took off. “Grace!”
“Sarah…and Franklin.” They stood together as I came into the room, Mrs. Boardman’s two hands pressed around Sarah’s one. “We’ll have to catch up as we work, dears. I’m afraid I am behind my time. Franklin…”
Mrs. Boardman gave me a crinkly old-lady smile. “I saved the folktales for you.”
I am very familiar with the Dewey decimal system and therefore did not need much direction. I managed to reshelve my entire stack, from the Grimm brothers to stories from
1001 Arabian Nights,
while Mrs. Boardman and Sarah worked side by side in nonfiction.
“Oh dear,
Extreme Bicycle Maneuvers,
” Mrs. Boardman chuckled, inserting her ruler between two books on the top shelf. Sarah Kervick pressed the book into place. “What will they think up next? Here’s
Surfing in CyberSpace.
That would be right…here, I believe.”
Sarah fit another book in the space Mrs. Boardman created with her ruler.
“Now, tell me how that lutz is coming….”
Mrs. Boardman had grown up in Norway, where people skated into town down frozen rivers, so she was very interested in Sarah’s skating activities. She even knew Debbi, Sarah’s skating coach, from church.
“Has Debbi taught you the Scandinavian stop? It was all the rage at the ’64 Olympics, you know.”
“Not yet, we just do the T and the L so far. She says I shouldn’t go too fast.”
I agreed with Debbi—when I could understand her Swedish accent—that Sarah should get a complete grounding in fundamentals before she attempted more difficult moves.
After we finished the shelving, Mrs. Boardman gave us a snack: Oreos for Sarah and Tree of Life organic garden vegetable crackers for me.
“And, Franklin, I have some very nice organic lemonade to go along with it.”
We sat there, eating over napkins and flipping through our favorite books. It was very peaceful.
Sarah looked up from one of the glossy skating books Mrs. Boardman had ordered for her through interlibrary loan.
“Remember when you used to read to me, Franklin? When you were teaching me?”
I nodded.
She sighed. “We should do that again sometime. You could read that story about Pandora that we got out of the library.”
“It was Gloria who said you should read it.” Long ago, when I’d hardly known Sarah, Gloria told me to show her the story of Pandora from Greek mythology. It was about a beautiful and curious girl who opens a box and lets all the evil things out into the world: sickness, hate, pain, jealousy, all of it. But she also frees the little winged creature called Hope, who gives heart to all who suffer.
“Well, I’ve been thinking about that story lately…,” Sarah said, drawing her finger across the table, “and I’m wondering this: How does she know where to go? Hope? With all the problems in the world, how does she choose?”
CHAPTER SIX
Filling in the Blanks
That evening, as I sat alone on my bed, tape measure in hand, I made a shocking discovery. My logbook, in which I’d recorded the varying lengths of my arms and legs on their mismatched journey to adulthood, was missing two entries. I had forgotten to measure for two straight days in a row! I needed no one to remind me that those days were gone forever.
Measuring my arms and legs was just a normal part of my day. I’d been doing it for years, ever since I noticed the different rates at which they grew. You see, despite an exhaustive search on the Internet, I had discovered no journal articles devoted to this subject. What if I had a rare and previously undiscovered growth deficiency? Could I be ushering in an age when asymmetrical children struggled with balance? Was all this due to my mother’s sinister love of the game “Airplane,” in which children are swung around and around by their developing limbs until their
Similar Books
