Dinner with the Smileys

I just finished Dinner with the Smileys (the only good thing about insomnia is the quiet-time for reading as I try to move back toward sleep), and the second half of the book is just as good as the first.  When I read about Ford, the eldest Smiley son, I think about my students and the changes they go through over a school year.  They are older than Ford, but the difference between one August and the next is still incredible as they find out who they are as young adults.  Reading about Ford, and sometimes Owen, I remember the days of teenage moodiness and discontent that I endured with my own girls.  Those days seemed to be so very long when I was in the midst of them, but looking back, they were a blip on the radar screen.  The hurtful things that were said as they tried to distance themselves from childhood and parents are outweighed by all the good, but it isn't always easy to see this mid-journey. 

While this book does a wonderful job of showing everyone what a military deployment looks like from one family's point of view, it does so much more than that.  It's a reminder to me that people are more important than whether or not all the laundry is folded, and that difficult times in our lives do pass, leaving us with experience and skills to handle more than we would have thought possible.  Sarah Smiley has written other books, but they will have to wait until I have MY summer reading for school done!