A sweet moment

I had a sweet moment yesterday.  But I have to back up a little bit.

Joel and I have been trading books this summer.  He often comes to me and asks what he should read next.  I sometimes pull out the "official" list, the one our co-op writing/ literature teacher sends out every summer.  He's read a lot of the books on that list.  It's a good list.  There are other good lists out there, but there are still plenty of great books that haven't made those lists ... yet.

So, early in the summer, I suggested Unbroken.  I hadn't read it yet, but Coty (and everyone else who's read it) liked it.  Joel read it quickly and told me I needed to read it.  So, I did.

Then I read Island of the World.  Next time he came asking for a book, that's what I suggested.  He's about 600 pages in now and I ask him just about every day what's happening.

Now, here's the sweet part.  As I read the book, I put little slips of paper in various places to mark pages with passages I loved.  Then I went back and copied the passages in my quote journal.  I thought I'd removed all my little markers after copying the passages, but apparently not.  Yesterday, Joel walked in the room where I was working and said he'd gotten to one of my markers.  Now, since this is a library book, of course, I had not underlined anything.  I asked him where he was in the story and he proceeded to read to me the exact passage I had copied.  I hadn't even hinted at it.  Honest.  He just knew why I had marked that page.

I felt happy.  Warm.  Connected.  Known.  And thankful that my 16 year old son found rich and meaningful something that had so resonated with me.   Yeah, it was a sweet moment.