Friday, June 22, 2007

O-P-I-E, Opie

I was reading Mother Goose to the older daughter (4 1/2) last night. I closed the book and was picking up her room when she said “O-PEE-AH…O-PEE-AH…That has some of the letters of my name.”

“What?”

She showed me the spine of her book: Opie/Wells, the editor and illustrator of this collection, and pointed at Opie: “See, mama, o-pee-ah.”

“You just read that. You read a word!”

She jumped up, her arms shot in the air, fists clenched, like Stallone in Rocky. “I did it! I read a word!” It’s funny--she didn’t even notice she had read it until I told her--she just sounded it out and the word made sense to her. But when I told her, her sense of thrill was electric. I picked her up and gave her a big hug. We went and told her father. When I tucked her in a few minutes later, she looked up at me and said, “Oh Mama, I read a word. I’m going to remember this day for the rest of my life. Are you going to remember it for the rest of your life?”

5 comments:

Anne Camille said...

How could you not remember that the rest of your life? :-)

Anonymous said...

What a truly beautiful post, Anne.

Unknown said...

Yeah--I'm still smiling!

Kate S. said...

What a glorious moment! Thanks for sharing it.

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