Screen Savers

We had a moment of amazing family happiness the other night. My younger son, Ned, has been a somewhat reluctant reader. I’m not sure why, because every time he actually sits down to read he has a pretty good time. Recently I invented something called “Family Reading Half-Hour” (Ned’s been told since first grade he’s supposed to read for 20 minutes a day, which he has always found burdensome. So I decided we’d do it with him. It’s no hardship for me and Jeff to sit on our butts and read. In fact, it’s a lot more pleasant than cleaning up after dinner or changing the cat box.)

The three of us started it while Alex was in the bath (I guess because we didn’t think he’d want to do Family Reading) but on Sunday night he joined us. The living room was silent. All screens – TV, iPod, computer – were dark. Alex looked intently through a book about Hanukkah with photographs and a lot of text. Now and then he grabbed my hand to point to something, and we’d read a few words out loud.

We do many things as a family – eat in Chinese restaurants and coffee shops, go on picnics and to amusement parks – but this was, I think, the first time we sat together quietly, enjoying the same thing without Alex deciding he’d rather be somewhere else or eat something else. Alex will sit in a restaurant but he never eats what we’re eating. We felt hopeful for a while about Chinese food but he sort of drifted away from it and now he eats crackers while we eat chow fun.

Of course the chocolate chip cookies (see confession below) I made before we sat down helped – but they were also a distraction for Alex. I think we’ll have family reading tonight and cookies or brownies to follow.

Photo by Kitten Fleming

Say what you like about not using food as a bribe or a reward. Family reading has given me more peace and happiness (and a little space to read) than practically anything I can think of, including Valium. If that doesn’t deserve to be celebrated with a freshly baked brownie, I don’t what does.

Confession: I use the mix in a bag most often. What makes it quite a convincing stand-in for making them from scratch is a tablespoon of vanilla extract, about half a teaspoon of salt, unsalted butter (never margarine) and some ground cinnamon.