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My Daughter

 When I visit my daughter's classroom, I imagine rapt listeners, quiet hands, calm bodies. Instead, one child is having a full meltdown; he is thrashing and singing, for reasons that seem unclear to everyone around him.


I have dressed as a rabbit; I'm reading "My Garden," by Kevin Henkes. The kids are unimpressed. First of all, the narrator is nameless. What's with that? Also, I have a nervous habit of  kissing my daughter on the head--one child lets me know, quite clearly, that this is distracting. Finally, my daughter herself was hoping for "The Poky Little Puppy." Why couldn't I bring *that* one?

The point of the "mystery reader" tradition is to share a bit of your family life--so I start to tell the kids about my daughter's garden. "Sometimes, when she gets up in the morning and leaves her bedroom, she looks down through the window and spots a bunny in the--"

A beady-eyed child interrupts. "Her bedroom is on the second floor? What is the bedroom like?"

If I answer this question, I cede control. I fall right into the trap. Immediately, we are all discussing whether or not we have beanbags. If we have a beanbag, we feel a need to disclose the *color* of the beanbag.

I write this for teachers everywhere. I forget what it's like to exist, day after day, in a room full of small children. Hats off.
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