A Reader in the Family

As most of you know, my youngest is developmentally challenged. She is healthy, joyous, funny, and lest you think she's a paragon, can be a brat or simply have attitude with us. In other words, normal, but as I bet other parents don't, we celebrate every teenage tantrum she pitches. Not in front of her of course. But soon she won't be a teenager any longer. We're already stretching it because in less than half a year she leaves her teenage years behind.

I'm not telling you this for sympathy or condolences. It's a fact of our lives and we live pretty (again that word) normally. As normal as any family with a few considerations. But one of the saddest aspects for me was that she was never a reader. She can read, but it was always a struggle for her because language is where her major difficulties lie. The rest of us--me, my husband, my other two daughters--we are huge readers. One of my twins was already reading before Kindergarten. The other twin took a little while longer, but became so addict to reading by seventh grade, that she was punished at school for reading too much (sounds more draconian than it was--it was a math class and she shouldn't have been reading; and now she's a writer too. I plan to collaborate with her soon). My husband reads a lot, and I'm never found far from a book. So it did make me sad that my youngest would never know the joys of books.

You know the minute you decide life has shown you one thing, it likes to slap you in the face and make a fool of you. And this one is a really good trick it played. I'm thrilled to announce that my youngest has started reading for fun. It's only been in the last couple of weeks. She's not reading adult novels, but who cares. She's been picking up picture books and junior novelizations and asking to buy books. She's been reading fan fic on the Internet! I can't tell you how thrilled I am that I have to tell her to put the book down and come play with the dogs. She seems to like reading on her iPad more than hard copies, but I'm good with that. Right now We're just celebrating that she's reading. Behind her back. We don't want her to become self-conscious about it, but I think she's shocked that I'm letting her buy every book she asks for.

I'm wet because we just got off of Splash Mountain at Disneyland

Who says life isn't interesting? Change happens.
--Gabi

Books I'm reading now:
The Cuckoo's Calling