Unfurled

Today’s a special day. I get to write TWO posts. I think this is only my way of avoiding sleep. Usually I’m bounding into bed, but lately, I’ve noticed, I try to stay up as late as I can. I usually don’t last very long because right around 10pm my eyes start feeling gritty and the deterioration in my mental and motor skills is such that I can’t do much except lie still– this is a genetically pre-determined trait that drove my father crazy when I was growing up. He was certain that I could never by a true intellectual superstar unless I stayed up well past midnight studying. Nothing made him happier than to see my nose buried in a book. And though he tried very, very hard– buying used math and history textbooks from the Barnes & Nobles, assigning my sister and me his own personal homework, taking us to the local public library every Saturday with a shopping cart (those gigantic, aluminum, old-lady ones) to fill with books– I personally could not get past Judy Bloom. I loved her. When I entered the fifth grade and was routinely going to bed at 10, he finally realized that his hopes of rearing an Einstein were hopelessly lost.

I suspect however, that he had his suspicions when he discovered much earlier that I sucked at long division.