I miss those days of Lego's underfoot and sharpened pencils. Of smudged workbooks and flashcards. Of reading-charts and rewards. Of my little ones gathered around me listening, snuggled close to their mama as I read aloud stories that transported us to another world. Our minds filled with imagination, stopping now and then to look up in our tattered, dog-eared, paper-back dictionary pronunciation and meaning.
I was learning right along with these children of mine. Not just lessons of spelling, composition and grammar, but lessons of grace and gratitude. Lessons of patience and perseverance. Of consistency and compassion.
As I have shared before, our boys went to Japanese kindergarten and elementary school. They were the only white faced foreigners, struggling to learn in Japanese as they learned Japanese. To keep up their English reading and writing, we home schooled in English early mornings before they walked out the door happily (and sometimes not so happily!!) down the road to join their black haired, almond-eyed friends. I look back and wonder some days how we did it. By God's grace we made mistakes, shed a lot of tears and struggled each day to balance Japanese and English in our home and family.
Reading at home was a way to help tip the scales a little more to the English-side in the midst of our Topsy-turvy world. Since we didn't have a library or English school (no Kindles or Internet back then either) we accumulated books and books, bought and borrowed. And soaked them up whenever and however we could. Even under a tree reading aloud at the park, quiet times to rest between slides and swings. And for sure before bed, with mugs of hot cocoa, taking turns sitting in front of the big, smelly kerosene heater.
So today, I am thankful for books. And for God's grace and help as we taught our kids to read in English...to live missionary life and to love in Japanese.
