We've been reading Charlotte's Web.
I've decided that this book is for mothers! And it's not really the sort of book that you try to read aloud to your child in a crazy-loud school gymnasium with all sorts of other mothers and kids around. This book is too emotional! We are still one to two chapters out from the part where Charlotte dies, and I could barely read without choking up. Just knowing what is coming. Seeing how oblivious the pig is to the love and sacrifice of his spider friend. How he is taking from her, completely unaware of what he is asking of her. Hearing Charlotte refer to her egg sac, the life she is breathing into her babies, as her magnum opus. And realizing that I have my own little magnum opus unfolding right here in my own home as I serve and love egocentric little children who want what they want, when they want it, and have no idea of the things I give up just because I love them and want to make them happy.
What a beautiful book! There is nothing like reading it in the midst of a hundred other mothers and kids, all the while having my sweet little "big boy" lean closer and closer into me, snuggling up to feel some of that mama love. He doesn't realize what he's going. All the way to school, whenever I tried to touch his shoulder or give him a quick sqeeze, he pulled away, embarrassed. Even then, as we read, if I was the one who initiated any display of public affection, he immediately removed the offending arm around his shoulder. Yet not ten seconds later, I would feel him pressed up against me, completely unaware that for all his efforts to avoid needing his Mom, he did and does and will need me for a great long time.
I kept reading, kept pausing at the parts where I felt my voice choking up and the tears welling in my eyes. Dallin tried to ground me in reality with his matter-of-fact reminder, "Yeah Mom, I know what happens. It's just a book, Mom."
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