RAE’S READS

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This year (2025) finds me with 53 years of teaching “under my belt.” I have taught all levels from pre-K “(library lady” or “book lady”–volunteer) to juniors, seniors, and graduate students enrolled in my Advanced Writing class at the university where I have just completed 34 years. My first paying teaching job was junior high, and I spent 13 years with ages 12-13, the “difficult years.” I had some of the “funnest” experiences with this age group. When I was no longer the “young, fun teacher,” I taught in an elementary school setting before sixth graders went on to junior high, teaching language arts blocs, an assignment that was a “dream-fit” for me. After completing graduate school in my 40s, I went on to community college, then university teaching. This past fall I accepted a part-time teaching job at Apogee Gulf Coast Schools in its first year at the Alvin campus. After my Better Half died n 2022, I achieved a lifelong dream: opening a bookstore of my own, Rae’s Reads. A year later, I sold the house we had lived in for 47 years and moved into the bookstore. My goal is to circulate and repurpose books. Just as teaching is “in my blood,” so is a passion for reading, writing, libraries, and everything bookish. This blog will be open to anyone who loves books, promotes literacy and wants to “come out and play.”

FRIDAY EARLY HOURS

Sated–with food, with fellowship, with parades and sale ads, with reading, with thinking–that’s the kind of day Thanksgiving Day tends to be. And now “they” expect us to shift gears and think about Christmas!

I am going to refuse and be a holdout.  I am going to leave my fabric turkeys and pumpkins on the mantel and on the hearth and use the fall-leaf runner and pumpkin/flower/fruit centerpiece on my green tablecloth with orange candles gracing the table instead of changing the runner and centerpiece on the green table cloth to Christmas trees and holly berries!  I entertained far more than usual from September 26 to Thanksgiving, so again I will holdout and refuse to entertain during the Christmas season except for tea or coffee for two or three at a time. I have a new teapot and saucer/bowls set for tea and snacks and  four kinds of coffee (thank you  Kurig for the best invention since sliced bread).  I will offer my friends refuge from the end of school and shopping madness in my living room as they put their feet up on my sea chest (large coffee table substitute) and sip peppermint tea and eat assorted easy-but-looks-like-you-fussed cookies.  Everyone who leaves my sanctuary will leave with a bag of homemade candy.  I may even glue a pinecone or ribbon on the plastic bag.

Here I said I was going to be a holdout on celebrating Christmas, and where is my mind wandering to now?  Hmmmm.  Guess it’s inevitable.

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4 responses to “FRIDAY EARLY HOURS”

  1. sjhigbee Avatar
    sjhigbee

    lol… I know what you mean! Except – I don’t, not really… As we don’t do Thanksgiving here, we don’t have all the frenzy running up to Thanksgiving with Christmas following hard on its heels. Which I MUST get going on! Lovely post:) and have a lovely week-end.

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    1. Rae Longest Avatar
      Rae Longest

      I am counting on a quiet weekend! I hope yours is simply lovely.

      Liked by 1 person

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      1. sjhigbee Avatar
        sjhigbee

        Yes… I’m expecting mine to be quiet, too:).

        Liked by 1 person

  2. Rae Longest Avatar
    Rae Longest

    We are truly blessed.

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