To Read or Not To Read

Once upon a time, for a little less than two years, I was the father of only one child. Dear F was the center of my life and, while it was in no way a carefree existence, I did not have to spend time debating certain decisions. If a conflict arose between what would be best for Fox and what would be best for me, well, F won. F wants the last muffin, F gets the last muffin.

Then came T…

Then came Q…

Part of our bedtime ritual is “the reading of the picture books” followed by “the reading of the chapter books.” When the children were little, they each chose two picture books and I would read Q’s first (shortest attention span), the T’s, and finally F’s and then finish with the chapter book that I chose myself. Easy as… except F decided that this wasn’t really fair (children are great at measuring fairness. I wonder if a system of teaching mathematics at schools – even up through calculus – could be built upon this ability) and so we devised a new household order: Q’s books were first one night, then T’s the next, and then F’s the next. The good news about this complicated system was that the children themselves kept track of whose turn came next and rigidly enforced it. (In fact, having 3 or more children made this easier. If only 2 were involved, I’m guessing that they’d both remember it was their turn every night.)

Now that the children are ever so much older and more mature, they squabble about chapter books instead of picture books. I choose the picture books and parts of my audience come and go as they please. Picture book time is mostly Q’s time these days. Chapter books, though, are selected by the children in turn. All problems solved? Naïve thinking, that. F developed a strategy of choosing the longest book possible, to maximize the time with “his” book. Then T started doing that, too, and soon both were deviously encouraging Q to choose the shortest chapter books they could find. With the advent of self-reading, though, this has mostly faded: a child uninterested in the current book can read a book to him or herself instead.

… except Q isn’t quite that far along yet. He can read short chapter books very well on his own, but the larger ones are still insurmountable. I expect by the end of the summer – at least by Christmas -- he’ll be able to read any book he wants and then tough chapter book dilemmas will be no more.

So today’s may be the last.

Q loves the “Eragon” book series. When he won a gift certificate to a book store from a drawing a couple years ago, he wanted the entire Eragon series. The third book was on the verge of being released and so we had him wait a month or two (no small feat) so that he could get the entire trilogy in one box set. Except when we finished the third book we found out that the series had expanded to four books. The fourth book is coming out soon… or eventually, anyway.

Everyone in my family knows that the best preparation for the release of a new book in a favorite series is to reread the most recent book… better is to reread the whole series. Especially if you were young and don’t remember all the details of your favorite series, which explains why Q wants to hear all three Eragon books again: his next three choices for chapter books.

Now there’s no hard rule against picking books we’ve already heard, but… well, it just isn’t done. There’s only so much group reading time – about 45 minutes a night – and to start repeating books is an insult the other people involved. And really large books, like every book in the Eragon series (over two months to read, each), aren’t quite subject to a veto, but…

So Q’s request is reasonable and backed up by the experience of everyone else in the family, yet it also goes against multiple unwritten rules of our tradition. He is not maliciously choosing something to annoy the others. He can’t read the book himself. Yet it sets his desires against the desires of the two others.

I can see why there’s an underground movement to make King Solomon the patron saint of parents and parenting-related decisions.

My decision isn’t totally made yet, which is unfortunate because we’re finishing T’s book after about 10 minutes of reading tonight. I’m probably going to read “Eragon” (and fend off complaints against unfairness with “He can’t read it himself” and “We read this one a long time ago.”) and rather hope that Q finds another book before we move onto the next one. I expect F and T to retaliate with long books for their next choices… maybe even books we’ve read before. (T’s likely to choose “Twilight”, for example. Oh, I might be able to counter that by offering to read “Eclipse,” saying that Q is old enough to hear it because he will be 8 by then…).

Maybe this is a minor decision, but it still pits the desires of one child against the desires of another. And other decisions will come along: in June, F’s Boy Scout summer camp, which I try to attend, is the same week as Q’s Cub Scout Day camp, which I try to attend. As they get older, the decisions seem more important, too.

Some things were easier once upon a time.