Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

As a kid, I always needed my daydreams to be technically possible.  Wildly improbable didn’t bother me, you understand–neither did unlikely to an astronomical degree.  As long as the subject was a theoretical possibility, I could lose myself in fantasies starring me, myself, and I doing heroic things, or triumphing over difficulties and disasters, or being swept off my feet by my crush-of-the-moment.

As a kid, I would have loved Andrew Clements.  That’s what his books feel like to me, as an adult reader–daydreams coming true because they are possible, even if they’re a stretch.  I picked up a copy of his About Average at a library sale and then listened to the audio of it while I was doing all the things after returning from Idaho, and it embodies that feel perfectly.  Jordan Johnston is likable, sweet, cheerful, and average; she dreams of being a star in a dozen different ways, and yet she hasn’t managed to make it happen.  Then comes an unexpected chance to use talents she didn’t feel really counted, and finally Jordan gets her chance to shine.  While that’s a beautiful moment (and ending), of course, I found Jordan’s thoughts and feelings over the course of the book to be just as enjoyable as the big finish.  She reminds me a bit of my second girlie, who has an older sister with a)showy talents and b)2.75 years more experience at everything.  It’s hard for a 9-year-old to appreciate the amazingness of her own heart, and it’s nigh impossible to convince a younger sister not to compare herself to her older sister without taking the age difference into consideration.  (I know this from personal experience.)  If you have a child who feels less than, even sometimes, this is a book he or she ought to read.

I’m passing it on to that second girlie now.