Holiday Hoopla

Christmas is over and thank heavens.  The holiday is a bit of a mountain to climb; all the preparations of gifts and food, keeping everyone happy and moving in one direction, the right amount of drinks and frivolous fun balanced with close family time. I would think this would all get easier as the kids get older.

There were many parts of the holiday that I enjoyed and will savor over the course of 2018 and I plan to put a little more thought into next year’s plan. Next year I don’t want to be the one person constantly in the kitchen preparing food. We’ve always had interesting meals for holidays, we don’t tend to have a big platter of meat as the main course. This year we had two vegans to work with and it was no easy feat. As per my last post I did prepare an almost all vegan spread and they were delicious recipes. Even with a perfect spread it was still off.  Next year I’m just going to have a ton of Indian food pre-prepared, ready to heat back up and served around the table. 

Everyone has expectations for the day and I have a sinking feeling that somehow I was not a good cruise director. Although I think whatever plans I had made or not made wouldn’t have mattered. What is it about holidays and family gatherings that bring out the negative or at least hurt feelings? It begs the age old question “why can’t we all just get along? It takes a lot of empathy to understand trauma and depression and while I am a caring person I feel like I’m being slowly pulled down the rabbit hole. So instead I’m putting my whole spirit into ushering in 2018. Let it be a good and peaceful year.

Raj the bookstore Tiger

by Kathleen T. Pelley
ill. by Paige Keiser
(2011)

Felicity holds up her beautiful new kitty and christens him “Raj” because of his golden coat and his chocolate stripes.  Raj patrols Felicity’s bookstore with the ferocity of a real tiger, happy with his life.  “Mornings began with a patrol of the storerooms, followed by sun basking in the front window.”  and “after a face wash and a snooze, it was time to greet the customers with a leg rub or a hearty meow.”   Oh the simple happiness.

And then Snowball comes to town…or at least to the bookstore and quickly dampens Raj’s tiger tendencies.  Snowball now struts his stuff while Raj cowers under chairs.  The reason for Raj’s sudden sadness…Snowball informs him that he’s “not a real tiger.  In fact, you’re just a plain old marmalade kitty-cat with muddy brown splotches that some people might call stripes.”  (insert snarky cat tone)

Oh, the indignation and with those words Raj is not the reigning cat of  the bookstore.After days of kitty sadness,  Felicity reads from William Blake’s  The Tiger , perking Raj up just a bit. Then Sanjiv Patel comes for the bookstore’s storytime and shares a video of India.  A Bengal tiger roars on screen, scaring Snowball and  Raj, except he remembers Blake’s poem and “roars” back.

Words can help or hurt and someone can easily take your gusto away just as it happens to Raj.  Reading this to students it could easily be applied to bullying and self esteem.  Would you rather cower under a chair or rise up and roar! 

Paige Keiser’s illustrations are charming and softly drawn.  Kaiser has a wonderful blog…Fox in Socks.

Other thoughts:

Roxanne at Books That Heal Kids  and
Successful Teaching review it as well.