One of my fondest childhood memories is of the time, each night before bed, when my dad would read us stories. Bible stories, fiction books, math textbooks (hehe), whatever the book, he would make it come alive. He did the best voices and sound effects and tickled us at all the opportune times. We looked forward to this bonding time, craved it. On the couch, Nathan and I would snuggle up on either elbow pining his arms to his sides. This sardine like configuration was necessary for optimal picture viewing and page turning opportunities. We were literally on the same page, enjoying the same thing, at the same time. There were no disabilities or tempers. No patience required. It was magical.
I looked forward to passing this experience on to my own kids. I think this desire was the only one I had of it's kind because I almost never thought in terms of passing things down to kids. I've never been convinced I would even have children. But, I thought, if I ever do have kids, there will be bedtime stories.
Cut to 25 years later...
"You can't leave without telling us a story!" Isaac Foster yells as he closes, locks, and physically blocks the front door. (We then have a brief talk about how rude that sounded and he asks again, polietly this time. It sounds just about the same, except with a please somewhere in there.)
"Okay," I say, as if I'm Mary Poppins and I'm humoring the children, "let's go. The story can't start until you're in your beds." And we all race down the hall with huge smiles on our faces.
I sit on the floor in front of them and ask each one, "What character would you like in the story?"
Noah says, "The ghost of Christmas hotdogs!"
"What in the world?...Okay." I say and I look at Caleb.
"The Phantom of the Opera!" he says.
We all look at Isaac and he gets a sly grin. "Burt the Troll! Hahahaha!" he exclaims. Everyone laughs and rolls their eyes because we knew that was coming. He always picks Burt the Troll. Isaac interrupts his own laughter by saying, "Actually Christina. I want to change mine to Christina."
"Okay", I smile and review, "The Ghost of Christmas hotdogs, Phantom of the Opera, and Christina. Are those you're final answers?"
All three boys nod yes.
The story begins...usually starting off slow as my brain tries to stay at least one word ahead of my mouth. I'm never quite sure what will come out next. These particular characters took us on a path from a struggling playwright to a story of musical superhero proportions with a sprinkle of A Christmas Carol along the way, ending with Christina selling her play and it being made into a movie for which Ethan (the oldest Foster brother) is hired to compose the sound track. He becomes a multimillionaire and supports us all the rest of our lives. (Ethan doesn't sit in the room with us or choose a character. He is a teenager and far too old for such childish things. But I know he's listening, because by the end of this particular story, he is playing the theme song to the musical Phantom of the Opera. *smile*)
Everyone cheers and happily says goodnight.
Suddenly, I realize a cherished childhood experience has indeed been passed on, not to my own children but, to the Foster boys. And what makes it so good is not the amount of silly voices, the crazy characters, or even the moral of the stories. What makes it magical is the undivided and delighted attention given and received between adults and children who love each other. And it's that kind of love that allows us to follow each other down any path the stories take us. All the troubles of this world, all the stress of the day, all the fights we just had about bedtime, and all the tasks of tomorrow go away. And these three remain laughter, imagination, and love.
Just like that the act of telling stories to each other has become as important to them as it always was to me. Without fail, I walk out of their bedroom and feel like I've been given the rarest of gifts from the most unexpected of sources and I treasure all these things and ponder them in my heart.
