Cooking up a Story

"What's for dinner?"
Parker had just come in from track practice, sweaty and tousled and ready to consume large amounts of protein.    Fortunately, I had already made myself a snack.  I've learned how to survive around here.
"How about breakfast for dinner?" I asked as I cleaned out the fridge for him.
"That sounds Ah-mazing!" he replied before disappearing downstairs.
I put biscuits in the oven, filled a pan with bacon, and started scrambling eggs.
And then...he was back.
With a book.
"I know what I can do while you cook," he said.  "I'll read to you."
And he did.
As I flipped and stirred and scrambled, he read about an underwater futuristic world in which a teenage boy and girl meet and begin an adventure.  He had checked it out from the school library and had already read the whole thing for his class.  But he thought I would enjoy it.  So he re-checked it, just for me.
I couldn't help remembering how excited he'd been about learning to read as a 5 year old.
And then how frustrated he'd been as a faltering first grader.  The words just didn't cooperate with his brain.  He made a valiant effort.  I happened to be in college (for the second time) and put my Teaching Reading classes to work.  I gave him Reading Surveys and Phonemic Awareness tests, made sight word games and took Running Records.  I found a web site with Lego comic strips to motivate him to keep reading SOMEthing.  But it never got easy for him.  And by third grade he resisted reading like a dog resists a trip to the vet.
So through it all, I read to him.
I love books...have always loved books.  And I didn't want him to lose the magic of Story.  So I read to him. And to keep him from feeling singled out, I kept reading to Hillary and even to Hubby.
And I never stopped.
Eventually (fifth grade) we found out he had Dyslexia.  We got a 504 plan at school and a tutoring program that provided strategies that worked with his unique brain.  His grades began to improve.  His confidence began to bloom.  But he still didn't choose to read if he didn't have to.  I pretty much gave up hope that he'd ever read for pleasure.
And now this handsome high school kid is standing in my kitchen, reading to me for fun.  His deepening voice still falters over a word now and then.  And he stops to ask me what something means.  His phrasing is a little un-even.  But all I hear is a miracle blooming.  He wrestles the words to get to the magic of Story.  What I've spent years sharing with him, he is now sharing with me.
I fill his plate with food and he fills my heart with hope.
He bookmarks the page.  But our story is far from over.