Slow

When I was in the 5th grade I couldn't read. Well okay, that's not entirely true. If I was given a harangue or story to read, I could effortlessly oblige without making any mistakes. But when asked what a passage was about, I would just stare blankly as if I hadn't comprehended a single word.

Because I hadn't.

I specifically remember one time in Ms. Dillans' 5th grade class. I was asked to read a paragraph regarding two men stranded on a raft in the middle of an ocean arguing over whose turn it was to do the fishing. While my mouth had been dutifully forming the sounds of the words translated from images of letters in my brain, my mind was busy contemplating why they would eat a high protein meal when they had no water (protein, of course, requires a lot of water to metabolize and would cause further dehydration) and how they might use their rubber jackets at night as funnels to collect condensation from the air for drinking. Before I knew it, the passage was over and the Ms. Dillan was asking me what it was about. I responded by mumbling something about cellular osmosis and diffusion gradients.

Even in the 80's it wasn't politically correct to use the words "idiot" or "stupid" or "retarded", not even if those words were being used to describe yourself. Today they use abbreviations like ADHD, LD, AS and CAPD. But back in the 80's, the PC term everyone used was simply "slow".

I was slow. I knew it, my teachers knew it, my friends knew it.

Even my mother often has to admit that I was a slow child. What else can you say about a 9 year old boy who couldn't remember his right hand from his left without thinking about the way a dog turns around before lying down, the direction of whirlpools and whirlwinds, the side a cow is milked from and a horse is mounted from, the direction of a twist of oak and sycamore leaves, the maze patterns of rock moss and of tree moss, the cleavage of limestone, the direction of a hawk's wheeling, of a shrike's hunting, and of a snake's coiling, the lay of cedar fronds and of balsam fronds, the twist of a hole dug by a skunk and by a badger (remembering pungently that skunks sometimes use old badger holes)? A normal kid would just remember his right from his left without all that nonsense.

I have never out-grown this affliction, but I can proudly say that I did eventually teach myself how to read.

Anyway this rambling and unorganized post, while symbolic in its irony, does indeed have a point.

While it's not set in stone, Lesley and I have tentatively come to the decision to home-school Zachary from the age of 5 until he is 10. This means that I would be in charge of delivering my son the bulk of the most influential developmental period of his life: his elementary education.

ME: the guy who, had he been born 50 years earlier, would have probably never finished 8th grade.

Yes, I'm aware of the shortcomings of home schooling. Yes, I'm aware of the social and academic pitfalls. I've listened to the arguments and I've done my own research confirming the validity of those arguments.

Why then, can't I stop being ecstatic at the notion of teaching my son?

I don't know ... but then again I've always been a little slow.