Its not everyones cup of tea...

"I hate books" he is bouncing his tennis ball against the wall, "You like to read?"
I smile at him, "yea, I like books" I pause, " There are some good books out there you just have to find the ones you like."
I ignores me and continues to lay on the ground and bounce his ball.
I volunteer once a week at a battered women's shelter in St. Paul as a Library Assistant. I love seeing the moms and their children come in and take advantage of all the books that the two rooms have to offer. Sometimes I let the woman's quote from the first night I came here echo in my head, "Its like a little sanctuary". With its cozy chairs and it's quiet walls it is.

The children's room is a different story from the mother's book room in that it has every kind of book any tiny foot elf would ever want to read. Mountains of mountains of books stacked in a chaotic order that range from Seuss to Judy Blume to the Boxcar kids. As I'm putting away some new children books that were donated to the library a tiny baby girl with tight light brown curls and a Nike outfit covered in orange Cheetos dust wobbles up to me and hands me the bag as to say "Do you want one?"
"What are these," I look at the bag,"Cheetos! wow thanks but I don't need any Cheetos today."
She wobbles around the room some more and eventually settles at the table where she plays with a puzzle.
I whisper
"This is a good puzzle," her wide blue eyes stare up at me and I think that maybe she might be a doll that had come alive for just a second," Can you put the animals back where they belong?"
And she doesn't get it. She just watches my face as I move the animals out of their spot and back to their spot again. Suddenly she laughs and her mother comes over to the table.
"Can you say monkey" she adds. The girl says nothing.
"I don't know what is wrong with her, some things she will say and then most things she won't."
"How old is she?" I ask.
"She is about 19 months"
"hrm," I look down and she is still looking up smiling at me with the most charismatic energy that I haven't felt in years, "well, some kids are just shy. It takes them a while."
Her mom shrugs. I don't know whats normal for a 19 month old baby or not but I wanted to tell her mom that I've never seen a baby offer me Cheetos before or smile so much. I could tell that her child was going to be one of the most good hearted, sweet natured women so who really cared how smart she was or going to be anyway. To me she was a baby genius.