More than just a good read

Every Monday, J gets to visit her school's library. What a simple thing - but like many other kindergarten experiences, what seems simple to me is profound to her. J has her own library card (responsibility) and can pick whatever book she likes each week (independence). Knowing the pride she feels surrounding this process, I make sure to fawn over her every selection.

Mostly she has come home with seasonal books, along with the odd 'Arthur' story here and there. I wish I was a fly on the wall so I could see if she is following her classmates' lead, or if she is wandering the shelves of her own volition. This week, however, she noted sweetly that she made a choice for me. The Black Book of Colors.

This is a book we first discovered over the summer, and enjoyed reading it together. I would say she is wildly perceptive in picking up how much I loved the book, but I know I gushed about it. The obvious take is that it can prompt a discussion with your child regarding disabilities, but I just love that it requires more of the reader's imagination than other books. This reliance on touch and thought takes you places inside yourself you would necessarily go if the images were more clearly defined. And what does each color mean to you?

It is a nice juxtaposition to Vincent's Colors, which we gave J for Christmas. Any fan of art will tell you that Impressionists (and Post-Impressionists) saw colors in places where you and I may only have seen shadows or light. Vincent's book forces your mind to deconstruct what you are actually seeing when a street lamp's light reflects off wet bricks, for instance. But I digress.

Revisiting the Black Book of Colors is a wonderful reminder of where J and I are together right now. She is reveling in her independence, but still is out-of-her-skin happy when I surprise her by showing up at her school for lunch. She groans but complies when asked to set the table, taking great care to place the napkins and utensil precisely as I've instructed her to. She can't wait to get out of the shower to kiss me, so plants a wet soapy love on my hand from inside the shower curtain. And she leans her head into the crook of my neck as I read to her in bed - a book she brought home just for me.

And so I read. I use my softest sleepy-time voice. I ask her to run her hands along the braille accompanying the text. Her little fingers skim over the letters, then roam to the opposite page where black embossed strawberries or blades of grass wait silently against the black page. Her eyes light up. Does she agree that brown can crunch like leaves under her feet? That water is meaningless without light?

We are on a journey together, snuggled under the covers with our mutual love wrapped tightly around us. Life still delights J at every turn, and it surprises me when I thought there were no more happy surprises left. Kindergarten can last forever as far as I am concerned....