On Learning

This morning at 4 am Fisher awoke and hollered "mom, I love you more than anything." And then a few minutes later Phoenix woke up and yelled for me to give her a book. Is there anything more pure than a thought that rattles out through the dark of sleep? This is how I start today, with words my children won't remember expressing. I have a good memory but still there are a lot of holes in what I learned in school. I finished the book The Days of Awe last week and it got me thinking about the holes in my high school education, particularly with history. Yes, basic facts were planted in my mind but a lot of it just remained as seeds because when you're young and in the midst of socialization and discovering yourself you don't appreciate or put much stock in learning about things that don't affect you currently. Kids are selfish, and it is meant to be this way as it's part of the process of aging. So to think what learning about historical figures and lessons at this stage of my life is intriguing as I have more appreciation for life than I did back then. So I have a new passion--reeducation. Imagine if there were schools for adults to simply reacquaint them with these lessons and facts--no need for grades or tests, but simply to appreciate. I see a lot of biographical reading in my future. We shouldn't let the responsibilities of adulthood--taking care of kids or working or getting caught up in all our routines--take away from continuing to feed our brains with knowledge.