You have turned into a gigantic bookworm. We’re blazing through the Magic Treehouse book series. At their early-reader font size and page length, we can get through about a book a day. Thank God there are dozens of them and other “chapter books” series to explore after that.
I can’t say I’ve been a prolific or consistent reader, and I usually prefer articles and magazines over books. You must have rubbed off on me because I am reading novels again and think I’m sleeping better because of it — reading your books and then mine before dozing off. Thanks for the nudge there.
Reading is incredibly important for many reasons but most important to me is how much knowledge I can extract from smart people who share their imagination (fiction) and wisdom (non-fiction) much faster than just about any other way to go about it — classrooms, networking, even podcasts.
We’ve recently found a new way to intersect your imagination with your passion for art: Eliza’s Art Shop. It’s a new game where I pretend to be on the computer and check your shop email. I’m your admin. I read aloud all the requests from friends and family for art orders: a picture of Lake Chelan for Grandma Vicki, a Tacoma Hat for Popa Roger, a fairy butterfly for Nonno, etc. You let me know how much each request costs and we exchange imaginary money for your toy cash register. I do not have permission to run the register for Eliza’s Art Shop yet but somehow I have all of the money from the people who emailed. You also have a very elastic price range between $3-$11. After receiving orders and exchanging money, you head toward your art area to fulfill the orders you’ve memorized. Sometime within an hour you reemerge with all the art to spec, hand it to me and ask if we’ve gotten any new email.
I am impressed by your work ethic, sense of economics and product order memorization. You also have a way of formalizing the inflections in your work voice that signals professionalism. I wouldn’t at all be surprised to see Eliza’s Art Shop flourish under your direction, and I’m a proud first employee. Between all of this reading and entrepreneurial endeavor, we’re both thinking big.
Love always,
Dad