It wasn't easy being different than the rest of the kids at school. Most of our friends had parents who gave them money. My brother David and me had to be creative in earning our spending money because our parents couldn't give us what they didn't have. We would come up with all kinds of ideas on how to make money and have fun at it too. One of our favorite entrepreneurial adventures was exploring caves for bat guano. Exploring caves is called spelunking. How did we earn money spelunking?We would gather all the bat shit we could find, scoop it up in gunny sacks, and sell it for fertilizer to a little old Italian man who lived down the street.
"I buya alla the guano you bringa me." he would say, and so he did. He had the best garden in the neighborhood. Heck, he had the best garden in the whole town. He would say to us, "You smart bambanos, you worka hard, you makea your parents proud." Sad to say I don't remember his name after fifty years, but I do remember his dark tan face, his sparkling eyes, and the way he always rolled up the sleeves of his clean white shirt just like my daddy did. David and I would take him a gunny sack full of guano and he would share with us the bounty of what he grew in his garden, plus a few bucks for spending money. Now that I look back on those times, I guess my brother and me wasn't as nearly as poor as we thought we were.
Janell Cannon's book, Stellaluna is a wonderful story about trying to fit in when you're just a little different than your friends. http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=s5&oq=Stellalu&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GWYE_enUS248US286&q=stellaluna+summary
http://www.superkids.com/aweb/pages/reviews/e_read2/stella/merge.shtml
Being a fruit bat may not be easy, because if you're different, you may have to try a little harder than most.
3 comments:
I'm lovin this stelluna book...makes me remember and dream of when my/our children were so young and innocent enough for me to read a book of this kind to them... and they would fall asleep dreaming that the world would actually be all right because there were people in the world that would accept their differences with grace, kindness, understanding...snd the joys of acceptance in diversity of the human kind.
and the worls would all be ok
nice post susan
I hope you and this brother are still close
lotta love there
pank
Thanks Pank, I'm glad you like the story- it's the idea that we can all learn from each other is what I like.
Like you say,"...kindness, understanding...and the joys of acceptance in diversity..."
I used to read the Stelaluna to Marlena when she was a little girl. Nice post. We've all been sick here, been out of sorts. I love you my friend.
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