Home School Dad

I confess. I'm a homeschooler, super-nerd from way back. I had a couple good teachers. One was my pa, whom we called Dad. Circulating on Facebook is a picture of him holding our baby more than 20 years ago. They're both laughing. I think he liked to laugh. He certainly liked to tell jokes, sneakily, with a straight face. I took one course from him, Genetics, and I remember other students mentioning that they'd be listening and taking notes and suddenly, whack, a funny had almost slipped by unnoticed.

When Dad was struggling with cancer, carrying things from one room to another presented a challenge. During a visit, I noticed an open Scientific American on a lamp table, a novel near his bed, and other magazines and books waiting almost everywhere. At the time, I thought it said something about his health. Looking back, I'm not sure. It might have been the way things always were.

I'd bet the decor of each of my siblings reflects his bookworm gene. Whether their brains also store starts and wait for finishes, I don't know. Let me take back "finishes." Homeschooling never ends.

"Sounds like multi-tasking to me," says Virginia.

Not really. It's more like Dumbledore's Pensieve, storing the memory and letting it rest while taking up another page, one topic at a time.