At least he knocked?

An email from Chandra this morning about Blake (nearly 3 yrs old):

SUBJECT: What I found knocking on my front door this morning . . .

When I asked him how he got that dirty playing in our neighbor's yard, he said they were making coffee for the worms in my neighbor's garden . . .

Voted most likely to . . .

. . . still get writer's block when approached with a blank yearbook page.

What is with the overwhelming pressure to write something pithy, clever, personal, original and memorable all at the same time? And actually, I thought I was past this particular anxiety-laden opportunity. One of the dangers of working in a high school, however, is facing students expectantly holding out their yearbooks to you, pen at the ready. I recall that I used to have a system--a couple of tried and true phrases or, at the very least, some delightfully artsy enough arrangement of my "best wishes" entry insuring that the graphically planned presentation masked the cliched content. Though any adult faces a similar situation each time they are presented with a group greeting card to sign. There's always that person who ruins it for everyone else by not just signing their name, but actually adding a lengthy message! Curse them and their wordy congratulations.
It all begins in an unthreatening manner in elementary school. A signed name would suffice--a neat cursive hand, if you could manage it. How excited we were to master penmanship! The same eroded penmanship that I spent long bouts of time translating in my high school days. I even annotated my yearbooks to note that the illegible scrawl was actually from Josh or Sarah K. or whichever friend-of-dubious-handwriting I had noticed trolling around those pages. My own signature is very much just my name written out in the same handwriting with which I would jot down a grocery list.

Ah, but as the years passed, a simple signature would no longer pass muster. Early on, we supported high school rivalries that we had no particular passion for, seeing as how we were in 8th grade and hadn't yet attended any of the secondary schools we fed into. Sprinkled amongst our self-consious school pictures were eloquent phrases like EAST RULZ! No, BARTLETT RULZ!! A little ridiculous, but fun.

This year, I prepared and even Googled some quotes. My favorite so far: "High school is like toliet paper. You only miss it when it's gone." Too crass, though, I'm wondering? Appropriate for an Adult Role Model? Should a librarian mention toliet paper? Might one be crossing the line by straying to Bathroom Matters? Hmmmmm . . . well, too late now.

On the down low

I did something a little different this morning. After pouring myself some Raisin Bran (I prefer Post, if you're wondering--yes, I am that particular), I ran downstairs to turn off the work reminder on my cell phone. My ever-faithful/ever-present dog, Bailey, trailed along, hot on my heels (I was carrying food, after all). Why go all the way back upstairs to eat? I thought. Thus we sat companionably plopped on the bedroom floor. (I don't often sit on my bedroom floor. On any floor, for that matter. Perhaps while stretching, or wrapping a present, I suppose. Otherwise, being often surrounded by overenthusiastic dogs, sheer self-preservation has usually kept me a couple of feet off the ground, at least.)

Anyhow, I was thinking of my upcoming day, Bailey--no doubt--thinking of how much he hoped I intended the extra milk for him. I was withholding the treat in what I thought a whimsical manner, but which the suffering Bailey no doubt viewed as capricious and cruel. He tried to appear relaxed--even had his head on the carpet--but I was no fool. I could feel the agitated muscles of his tense body leaning up against me. Seriously, 120 lbs of alert Old English Sheepdog is hard to overlook. Though I must say that I understood his eagerness. After-cereal-milk is a precious delicacy. When I was little, I campaigned vigorously at the grocery store for the Smurfberries cereal--solely due to the fact that the leftover milk was deliciously sugary and boasted a lovely lavendar shade.

Early morning moments--good times.