Goodnight Moon

Goodnight stars
Goodnight air
Goodnight noises everywhere - Margaret Wise Brown

I read to Maeve so much that I'm often near hoarse by the end of the day.  I'd say reading takes up about half our time together each day.  But I just started reading her a bedtime book, and my choice for a bedtime book was pretty much a no-brainer.

Margaret Wise Brown's gentle, quiet book was published in 1947, which means Goodnight Moon is in its eighth decade of readership.  Reading it to Maeve connects me to the millions of parents who have read it to their children through the years.  It gives me almost the same feeling that singing Be Thou My Vision in church used to do, a hymn that has existed since the twelfth century.  I felt I had joined a 900 year old chorus of saints, our voices connecting through the centuries.

Bedtime reading, as I have discovered, is an entirely different experience from our usual daytime reading.  There is a hush that permeates the room as thoroughly as if we were reading in the Bodleian Library after hours, as her sleepy eyes try their best to look for the three little bears sitting on chairs, a comb and a brush, and a bowl full of mush.

I know these are quicksilver moments.  I do not grasp at them, I just breathe deeply and try to remember what this feels like.  And it feels like holding a firefly in the palm of my hand, quietly glowing on a dark summer's night.

A daytime read of the most popular alphabet book - M