Sunday, January 20, 2008

Maybe She Does Pay Attention Sometimes

My stepdaughter, who is 14 and a very typical teenager, surprised me a bit the other day when I picked her up from school. She was carrying in her arms a rather large stack of books, which I figured were for some paper or project she had to do. Rather, she told me that she had rescued them from the library's discard box (apparently the library, or Media Center as they like to call it at her school, was doing a little selective downsizing). I asked what she got and she said "a bunch of random books." When asked why she did so, she said that the books were about "random topics of interest" to her. I guess "random" is a typical pattern for 14 year old girls. Then she said that she had picked one up for me. And so, I now have So Proudly She Sailed: Tales of Old Ironsides written in 1981 by Olga Cabral. My wife was as impressed as I was that she picked out this book with me in mind. I guess it goes to show that no matter how little we have in common, she does pay attention to what my interests are. I suppose its kind of like how I buy her a bunch of CDs every Christmas, even though I hate the music she listens to. Anyway, as for the book, it is a fictional account of course, but illustrated with drawings of Old Ironsides and portraits some of her officers, all from reputable sources such as the US Naval Academy and various museums. If you look at the Amazon citation, it says the book is for 9-12 year olds, but I'll probably still give it a read one day.

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