Picture books and Macaroni and Cheese

Two local grocery chains supply soon-to-be-out-of-date food to the Rose ACT programs. Wednesday Ruth brought a large cardboard box of frozen macaroni and cheese dinners from Pick and Pay to the grannies meeting.

The Wednesday grannies are more in number than the group I met with at the Baptist church. There were 24 ladies and one gentleman. They usually meet under a sheet of plastic stretched across a junk-wood frame between two buildings, but the man who owns the space forgot to move his car this Wednesday morning. So the ladies lined up their plastic garden chairs along the wall of the neighboring house where the shadow fell a few feet into the brick drive.

Twenty-five people all in a row make quite a line. I stood in the sun and read my stories, walking from one end of the line to the other to be sure everyone saw the pictures and understood what was going on. Imelda, who might have translated, was busy heating the mac and cheese and despite their assurances, these ladies didn't seem as educated or fluent in English as the Friday group. I was less confident that they would understand someone merely standing up front talking in a language that wasn't their own. But they laughed appreciatively as Lulama tricked the baboons, the python and the lion and at last made her way home to her mother's arms. They nodded agreement when I explained my reasons for reading with their grandchildren.

When I had finished, one woman asked, "What do you do when the children are older and don't want to read?" Too often the TV stays on all the time, and modern young people don't want to listen to their granny. I will need to think through some appropriate suggestions for reaching the older ones.

I wish I could give every one of these grannies a $2 copy Our Gran. They cooed delightedly when I read it as an example of how a story can help to introduce a sensitive topic. It describes them and all they do for their families. Together they had 129 grandchildren and 49 great-grandchildren, although not all of those were living with the grandparents. And Ruth told me that the lady with the most grandchildren (23) wasn't even there!

Imelda and Selina brought plates of mac and cheese as fast as the capacity of Imelda's small oven allowed. I found a seat in the shade along the wall, reminding myself how nice the African sun should feel after a Northern winter, and how good my tan would look when I returned to Wisconsin. After all, at this altitude the sun isn't what it can be in the lowfeldt.

The woman next to me pulled a small plastic storage container out of her bag, and slid most of her portion of mac and cheese into it to take home.

"For my grand daughter," she explained, saving only the last couple bites for herself.