Tomoko Tortoise?

from yesterday's visit to the Park Lake

"I may be s-low...but ah'm sure."

As a little girl, I listened often to a recording of the tale of "The Tortoise and the Hare", in which the Tortoise repeated those words, which were, of course, the moral of the story.

Today's post is a toast to the tortoise
Not a frowning or a downing of the hare ("downing"?)
Someone please me feed
The words that I need
To end this rhyme with "rigor mortis"!

I have always been the slowest one in the family.  When we were in Michigan for my 3rd grade, I remember when we first got to the U.S., the school wanted to be extra careful that we were up to our grade level (sometimes, schools overseas don't demand as much, so the child coming into U.S. schools find themselves behind the other students in the same grade).  So my sisters and I were put back a year at the beginning, and our parents were told we would be put back up into our original grades as soon as we showed we were able.

Glass Turtle in Dad's House...from elementary days!

It seems Joyce, the most talkative one of us "3 J's", made it very apparent from that first day in school that she really needn't stay back a year--the next day, the teacher placed her back up a grade.

It took Janice--a year younger than me--a week before the teacher was positive that she would be all right...so she was put back up then...into the same grade I had been placed into!

It seemed quite a bit of time went by that way, with my sisters returned to their grades, but me still in the same class as my younger sister.

"I'm the dumbest of the three of us, aren't I?" I remember asking my Mom then.  After all, Joyce and Janice had proven they were smart enough to return to their grades; I hadn't.

My Mom went to school the very next day to talk with the teacher.  She was told then that "June wasn't dumb; she's just so quiet and is no problem at all; I just didn't think about her!"  I was put back in my grade the next day.

Happy me.  Slow, but sure.

One of the first things I did when I was put back in "my grade" was to write a story...about a kind, friendly-but-lonely giant.  I liked writing even back then.

If you're wondering, I'm still working on the book quite a bit and have written material probably double the amount I've written before (I wrote short narratives of both my parents' testimonies before).  Thank you for your prayers for this slow-but-sure writer!