So, here it is the middle of August and those obnoxious back to school ads are beginning to pop up on t.v. and in the circulars left on my driveway (pure litter). When people look at me I can see the question forming in their brain, the hated question -- "So, when do you go back to work?" Cringe! I'm not ready to think about that. Honestly, I haven't checked the calendar. It's not foremost in my thoughts. I'll wait until I get that letter from my superintendent, then I'll think about it. Now leave me alone.
Still, one of the nice things about going back to work in the fall is opening the new boxes of books that arrived over the summer. For me, it's like Christmas and my birthday rolled into one. I love the bright, crisp dust jackets, the stiff feel of the spine when I open a book for the first time. I love to drool over the new picture books, savor the poetry, pore over the stunning new nonfiction books with their beautiful photographs and drawings. Children's books have come a long way over the past thirty years.
Maybe one day I, too, will have a book in a box that some librarian is opening for the first time. Maybe. Of course, I still have a lot of work ahead so I can't let myself dream about anything until I have the legwork done.
So, back to my manuscript. Where was I? Oh yes, trying to write some paragraphs in Middle English. I must be nuts. Thank God for my son's Chaucer glossary. I just wish it worked in reverse. I can only use it to look up the meaning of Middle English words. How to say "pair of wings" in Middle English? Anybody know? How about shoe? After trying every known combination and then some, I'm convinced that the people of the Middle English period all walked around barefoot.
So it goes, as Vonnegut might have said.
