Chocolate stars

Being Epiphany today, and being that we were too sick to do much baking in December, we made cut-out stars covered in chocolate buttercream frosting (left over from the Yule log). Never underestimate the power of chocolate to make a sugar cookie irresistable. It took all day to convince everyone to get on boots, jackets, mittens, something on the head and go to the kitchen store for a cutter and the grocery store for flour. Despite an hour long detour at the library, we had cookie dough chilling in the fridge by 4pm.

Knowing I had about another hour before the dinnertime meltdown/fight/freakout would begin, we opted for some quiet time on the couch with a Frog and Toad book, read aloud by the author on a cassette tape. I haven't used one for years. I handled it like a historic artifact when putting it into the one functioning tape player we have, a relic from my 10th birthday. But when the author's voice came on, Elliott was awed -- here is the guy who wrote this book, reading it to me! He quickly figured out the beep for the page turn and sat on the edge of the couch as he listened. When it was over he asked, "can we put it back on track one?" The rewind process was as fascinating as hearing the voice. Twice more he listened to the entire book. I tried to look through a remodeling book I picked up at the library, but Dietrich wasn't about to let Arnold Lobel do all the work -- he crawled into my lap, replacing Basements with his copy of Frog and Toad All Year.

Lobel reads deliberately. He reads as if each word has been worked over, chosen carefully among the many possibilities. He reads as if this is the only thing that matters in the world. He is reading to anyone who happens upon the cassette tape on the bottom shelf of the library, but when a child hears him, he feels as though the book was written just for him. Granted, this is his life's work. But isn't reading to my kids a great deal of my life's work? It isn't just that I read too fast, I read to easily. I read with one thought somewhere on the page, another on the kid in my lap or the other one beside me, another thought on whether I should put on warmer socks or turn up the thermostat. How might I read as though this story, this child or children, this moment, were the only one that mattered in the world?

The dough turned out a bit uneven, but easy to cut and transfer to the baking sheet. There was a breakdown in emotional equilibrium shortly thereafter over why we couldn't read two more stories before dinner (ahem, you are throwing a fit because you are hungry!). Some doors were slammed and feelings hurt. But we eventually sat, sang grace, and ate something resembling a dinner. When the stars were ready -- dripping with warmed buttercream frosting -- there was silent eating, the surest sign of pleasure.