Our Children
I have known the content of this bookworm for weeks, but that changed on Tuesday. Twenty-one people, including 19 third and fourth-grade children and 2 teachers were killed in an attack at a school in Uvalde, Texas. This bookworm was supposed to be all about our upcoming Summer Reading Program (SRP), but I just can’t ignore yet another tragedy.
Before I left for work on Wednesday I asked my husband what needed to be done. How do we fix this? Why does this keep happening? Do you realize that at any moment, any place, any of us could become victims of an attack? A grocery store, a movie theater, a church, a school, a library.
Living in fear is awful, but it feels like there currently is not another option. I mentioned transcending last week, we will continue to live, but how do we overcome when nothing changes. No worries, that is as far as I am going, there are so many hot topics that I know I cannot touch, but I have to share a couple of quotes first because they just sum up my frustration. David M – “This is becoming what defines us. A continuing descent into madness.” Amanda L – “Don’t even suggest arming teachers. Some of y’all don’t even trust us to select library books.”
On Wednesday we started early registration for SRP and had 44 kids at story time. 44 kids. Not counting the adults, this place was packed. I was thrilled, but the fear from the night before made me realize how vulnerable we are. 44 kids that were blessed with another day, unlike the 19 from the night before. Like I said before, we will transcend, we will overcome, we will enjoy 2 months of SRP fun. Does that rhyme? Ughhh… Finally, we are to my original planned content.
Every Wednesday at 10am there will be programming for toddlers through teens. We have 2 authors visiting this year, Kevin Sherry on June 29th and Bruce Hale on July 27th. There will be SRP theme adult book bags for check out both months. The bags contain 2 books, a movie, a snack and an activity. The bags, books and movies are returned; the rest you keep. O.U.R. story time is coming back on June 16th and July 21st at 4pm. This is for Our Unique (adult) Readers. The teens will be having their own book club just like the adults, including books with the SRP theme. Oh, yeah, by the way, the theme is Ocean of Possibilities. We will have adult craft night on July 19th at 6:30pm, Mary Jo and Melissa will be teaching embossing, sign up will start July 1st. LEGO Play will be on June 11th and July 9th at 10:30am. Ranch House Story Time will be on June 18th and July 16th at 9am. Farmers’ Market will continue through both months, June 4th and 18th and July 2nd and 16th, with the Kid’s Market on July 30th. Also, our new ocean themed activity kits will be out next week. Hopefully I got everything listed, oops, forgot the reading part. SRP is for all ages, there are incentive and reading charts for everyone. Completion of either chart gets you entered for 1 of the 6 grand prizes.
There, I did the best that I could. I will not offer the families of the victims my thoughts and prayers, they deserve more than that, our children deserve more than that. I will repeat my words from last week. “We will all continue our fragile presence on this Earth. I will transcend the ugly things that honestly don’t count. I will live with a giggle and “they will fire me for this” attitude, enjoying each second I am given.” This week, I will add that I will try to transcend the fear, but I sure hope we fix this, enough is enough.