Every time I open the door to the office closet, I have to
face the possibility that I made a mistake. Lurking in that closet are stacks
of boxes holding school supplies, lesson plans, notes from former students, and
171 young adult literature books. Remnants from my time as a middle school
English teacher. At this juncture, I don’t know if I’ll ever return the
classroom as a teacher, but I keep clinging to my teacher “stuff.” I think I’m
waiting for it to make a decision for me. Silly? Yeah. But I’m not quite ready
to let it all go.
What I am ready for is to tackle a project I’ve wanted to
complete since the day I became a teacher. In the beginning of my career, I had
grandiose dreams (Ideal Reality) of reading everything my students read so I
could give recommendations and help them select books that would motivate them
to read and learn. I was the Queen Pack Rat of Young Adult Literature, foraging
garage sales and used book stores for anything I thought my students would
enjoy. I was going to read them all and write stellar summaries for each book.
That plan never came to fruition (Real Reality). Until now.
I declare 2013 the year I plow through the 171 YA lit books in my closet (Ideal
Reality becoming Real Reality!). At the minimum, I will list and link them on a
YA Lit page on my blog. At the most, I will write summaries and offer my recommendation
to read or not to read. I do reserve the right to abandon any book that doesn’t
light my fire after 100 pages. I trained hard over the years to get myself to
ditch yucky books. I can’t slip now.
I’ll also be reading other genres: kid lit, adult lit,
professional development lit, non-fiction, memoirs, and who knows what else. I’ll
pop these onto the site, too, on respective pages.
I hope you’ll follow – or even join me – on my journey.
Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing … Keep It Real.
