Today is ugly. The morning is dark. A strong wind is whipping everything back and forth, even the big limbs still covered in leaves are being tossed. I can hear that wind. Rain is predicted.

I remember Dick and Jane and their little sister Sally and who could forget Spot and Puff. I was in the first grade. They were in my first reader, Fun with Dick and Jane. Jane wore dresses all the time, frilly dresses. She had blonde hair sometimes tied with red ribbons. They never did anything once, “Run, run, Dick, run,” said Sally. “Look, Jane, look, look, see Dick.” Even the pets talked in doubles. Sometimes we’d read the books out loud as a class. We sounded sing-songy. Other times the nun would call one of us to read. I remember using my finger under the words so I could kept track. The books got boring quickly. We could read run runs and looks and sees only a few times. It was then we’d move on to another book with Dick and Jane. Each book had new words to learn, bigger words. I don’t remember when we were done with Dick and Jane, but I do remember different readers, bigger books with individual stories and questions at the end of each. The stories were actually interesting, and the questions were easy. They were in the same order as the story. They were usually homework.

The other lesson I remember is learning how to use the dictionary. That words were in the same order as the alphabet was the first thing we learned. I remember the guide words at the top of each page. That was the big lesson. We had work sheets with words, and we had to find the guide words for each of them. The test we had was the same. I loved my dictionaries. I used to open a page at random and look for new words. I kept a paperback dictionary near my bed so I could look up words I didn’t know when I was reading before going to sleep. I still have my red covered Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. The pages have begun to yellow.

In Ghana, I used to teach my students fun sounding words. Their favorite was bamboozle. I remember a history teacher asking me if I had taught them that word because it appeared in several essays. It seems the British bamboozled the Ashanti.

My dance card this week has my regular uke events, my practice and lesson, and also two concerts. I have a doctor’s appointment today, just a regular check-up. During the rest of the week I might vacuum and dust though I’m hesitant as I don’t want to risk my inner sloth.

This entry was posted on October 20, 2025 at 12:32 pm and is filed under Musings. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. Both comments and pings are currently closed.