Yes, Virginia

...you can make your Pinewood Derby car yourself! And we did it. The cars looked awesome. Ollie's is the "Area 51 Hybrid," a camouflaged Prius that he spray painted on the front lawn of the Science Museum this afternoon and then hid in a doughnut box behind the wheels of the van. Walter made the "Platyprius," another Prius-like vehicle with a platypus nose cut to a brush on the front. We registered them both for the race, and both had a little extra weight added once we were there, but we're prepared for tomorrow morning.

We ended up going to the Science Museum with some friends this afternoon, and I lost track of time and made Frances late to her ballet practice.

With our final free IMAX tickets, we saw "The Alps," which is now my favorite of the IMAX movies I've seen ("The Grand Canyon" is a very close second). The footage was incredible, the story a little much (I had a hard time believing that climbing the north face of the Eiger really did cleanse all the pain of his father's death), and I learned basic cultural literacy type information about the Alps, as did the kids (name two peaks in the Alps; tell me some countries the Alps go through; what rocks form the Alps? Do people really live there and how do they cross from place to place?). But it was by far the most barfilicious IMAX movie I've ever seen. They're all kind of bad, but this one took the cake for nauseating sweeping camera moves and balance-off-kiltering twists and turns and pans. I had to close my eyes about fifteen times just to keep from losing my lunch. And I had skipped lunch. And I had taken Dramamine, as I always do before these films....

At home we have done a lot of reading. Tonight was a night of finishing. We read the last three pages of _Belle Prater's Boy_, the book we had been listening to in the car and whose final CD skipped and then went dead in the last three minutes of the novel. We finished _The Midwife's Apprentice_, a great little book that we had started yesterday (part of the magic library of books to be sold that I'm keeping). And then we read a novella by Gary Paulsen called _Nightjohn_. This would be one of those instances where pre-reading a book to share with children would have been a good idea. Oops. It is a book written from the point of view of a slave with a wicked, sadistic master. A new slave comes and begins to teach her to read and write, and the beatings begin. Kerry asked me, "So, was it graphic?" Let's just say that would be an understatement. I was torn between feeling like I was going to deeply disturb Ollie and scar him for life (Walter had been listening, but thank goodness fell asleep about halfway through, so he only heard half of the horrific descriptions of torture) and feeling like it is an important story to tell. It is fiction, but based on some people's reality somewhere, and it puts into perspective why so many people were weeping at Barack Obama's inauguration, why this moment has touched the hearts of so many and has been inspiring. Since we're heading to a Civil War battlefield on Tuesday and since we live in the heart of the Confederacy and see those little rebel flags on trucks and homes every single day, I figured it doesn't hurt to hear yet again some more of the story. But really, I hope that he'll be okay....

To cleanse our minds a bit after that intensity, I let him stay up later than I should have and we started a new book, _All the Way Home_ by Patricia Riley Giff. She's currently one of my favorite writers, and we've loved all of her books. This one is set in 1941 and has gotten off to a slow and maybe intentionally confusing start. It is the story of a girl who has had polio who has been adopted by her former nurse and a boy who is staying with that nurse, who is a friend of his mother's, while his parents both find work because they have lost their farm and are in financial distress. Against this, I believe World War II is going to start. So it is a good fit with the topic we've chosen for our first co-op class, which is World War II. The boys are focusing more on generals, leaders, countries, and causes of war, where the girls are focusing more on life on the home front and daily life at home. This is yet another book filling in some of the narrative of children who lived at that time, so why not stay on a roll with this theme.

It has me wanting to find some more books about polio to read to him. I think it was _In the Shadow of Polio_ that was so moving for me--just well-written and frightening and personal. I wish every single day that I could talk with my Mom again about what her life was like when she was young. It's hard to believe that I never did, but I guess we just don't always think of those things when we still have the time to do it, and the next thing you know, it's too late. I want to know so many things--where she was in the hospital and exactly how long and what her treatments were and whether they hurt and whether she was ever in an iron lung and what relationships she made with the other patients and what her life was like after her recovery. Could her parents come see her whenever they wanted? Did she have breathing problems? Did other children around her die? And then there are just general questions about the 1930s and 40s. How did the Depression appear through her eyes? Where was her family living? What kinds of things did they have? What was she doing when Pearl Harbor was bombed? Does she remember ration stamps? Did she collect war stamps? Did her family buy war bonds? Did she collect newspapers or tin foil or scrap metal? Her brother joined the Navy when he was 16. Was she worried about him every single day? Did her parents show their stress and concern to her? Did they hang a blue star flag in their window? Did anyone she know die? Did any of her friends' brothers die? How did she get her news? Did she go to serialized movies every week? Did her family have a victory garden? I am positively devastated that I know nothing about my own family and my own mother. My children are positively dying to hear this stuff from her. And I have no one who would know. I think of my Grandma and Grandpa, who also never talked about any of these things. Compared to my life so far, what difficulties they endured as parents. First a son who dropped out of high school to go fight in the Pacific and then never returned to live at home (he married a woman he met in California after his ship returned to the States and before he was discharged), and then their daughter contracts polio weeks before her college graduation. Both of these are parental nightmares. And there was such silence about them in our family! Maybe not intentional, but it's amazing that these things never or almost never came up. I suppose it was a different generation, not so prone to talking about their anxiety, things kept hushed a bit more, emotions held close to themselves. To anyone who might be reading this: ask your questions now! Carpe diem! Gather your rosebuds while ye may! Don't sit around wondering, get those stories and histories! Because one day you'll turn around and your entire family might be dead and your opportunity will be forever lost!

In the car, we're listening to _Ella Enchanted_, which Ollie is really liking and which I can't keep my mind on to save my life. I tell you, I just can't abide novel-length stories about fairies, gnomes, elves, sorcerors, and the like. My brain goes numb and I stop paying attention. And I don't do audio books particularly well under any circumstances. What's funny is that Ollie is now thinking that this is the book he might like to pick for book club when his turn comes in about two months. I can see the looks on the other boys' faces now.... A book about a girl with a magic curse put upon her at birth. A book about a girl! I find it absolutely endearing. I'm really proud that he is so open to all books, regardless of what they might be typed by others. It reminds me that we need to get back to the Little House series. I think we're on Farmer Boy, which isn't most people's favorite.

And drumroll please...today Ollie finished Saxon 5/4! It is a banner day. We need to celebrate with a cake or something. I am proud and excited about all we have accomplished this year and how we were able to make a daily habit out of doing small amounts of schoolwork. All kinds of things used to throw us off, but now that our whole mindset has changed, we get our work done every single day, with very, very, very few exceptions, and somehow it is shoehorned in even when there's a lot of other stuff going on. For example, today. We watched a friend's children for most of the morning, and then we made plans to go to the museum with them after lunch, but between them leaving and lunchtime, we got our minimal everything done, and then we were free to have a fun-directed day from then on. There's hope yet for other changes I'd like to see happen!