Bow and the Missouri Conservationist

Bow loves leafing through magazines. Usually, he does not seem to be reading them intently, but he likes to look at the pictures. For instance, just last week he got a new issue of Harper's Bazaar and enjoyed looking at all the new fashion choices.

But last Wednesday a friend of his, who comes by and brings him bananas every week, brought him a few issues of the Missouri Conservationist, and that is a completely different kind of magazine.

Bow can be very boisterous and exuberant, and sometimes when is in the midst of a dominance display, this can seem very uncivilized to humans who observe him. But Bow also has his quiet, focused moments. He took a lot of time with these magazines, and he was very gentle with them. He would pause for moments at a time, looking at a page and thinking about it.

Some of the headings of these articles use letters in  large typeface, and they feature very familiar-looking words.

What do you suppose Bow was thinking to himself when he came across this heading: BOW FISHING ? Did he think it was about him? He stared at the man in the picture for a long time.

Or how about this easy-to-read caption: BIRDS ARE AWESOME.

I don't use words like "awesome" very much, but Bow is familiar with them, because the interns who volunteered with Bow used to pepper their speech with that word. "It's awesome that he used his words with a stranger!" Sara can be overheard saying to Allie in one of our earlier Project Bow DVDs. So Bow is familiar with these words, and this may be writing at just the right level of simplicity to capture his attention on the page.

Bow can read, but that does not mean that he will sit down and read a book cover to cover or even a page in a magazine in proper sequence. On the other hand, he recognizes words and phrases very easily. The Missouri Conservationist is full of beautiful images of many plants and animals. Bow took it all in, but he paused the longest on the images of human beings accompanied by familiar words.

The picture above, of boys and girls shooting at targets using bows and arrows, had him pause for much longer than any other image. He likes people. He likes children. And he likes  the word "bow"!

Bad Apple

Yesterday was my day off. When I returned from my errands, on the dining room table, on a paper napkin over which was an apple with one bite taken out of it, Lawrence had written: "Bow took bite of this, spit it out and said it was bad. Do you think others?"

He was referring to all the other apples that had come in that bag. If this was a bad apple, were all the other apples bad? I felt of the apple, and it was hard and unyielding. There was no indication to me that it was rotten. The only reason the part Bow had taken a bite of was brown was because of the normal oxidation process.

I went to the pen to ask Lawrence about it. Lawrence said he had asked Bow why he thought the apple was bad, but Bow, who is not good at answering questions that start with "why" had merely answered: "Because it is bad."

In the evening I made my own investigation. I cut open the apple, tried to remove the oxidated spots and bit into it. The apple tasted fine. I then took it into the pen with Bow, along with the napkin, to begin an inquiry of my own.

"Bow, do you know what it says here?" I asked him, brandishing the napkin. "What does it say?"                                                                                                          "?אתה יודע מה כתוב כאן? מה כתוב כאן"

I then read him the napkin, word for word. While I was reading it out loud to him, Bow followed along on the napkin, pointing at the appropriate words. He can read. But when I was done he looked away, as if totally uninterested in the issue that the napkin's words addressed.


"Is it bad? Look, I am eating now," I said and took a bite of the apple. "Is it bad?"
                                                   "?האם זה רע? תסתכל' אני אוכלת את זה עכשיו. האם זה רע"

Bow picked up the apple and started eating it. He finished the whole thing. There was no more talk about the apple being bad.

Mind you, this was one of a bag of red delicious apples, which are the least tasty of all the apples in the store. Even the Wikipedia says they don't taste so good.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Delicious

But that's why they have the lowest price per pound from all the apples in the grocery store. Supply and demand. These are human grade apples, fit for eating. I eat them, too.  I also let Bow have more expensive apples in moderation, but I can't have him turning up his nose on the red delicious as long as we are on a budget.

I think he understands. And, yes, he can read!

Bow Helps Proof "Theodosia and the Pirates"

I am getting ready to publish a new book. The artwork is ready and the cover is set, but I am still doing some last minute proofing of the interior. As always, Bow is eager to help.

When he sees me holding a pen and marking errors, Bow wants to join in. I only let him mark the title and "Other Books by Aya Katz" pages with his corrections, though, because I don't always agree with him about what needs to be corrected. He's a bit pickier than me and finds fault with things that I think might be all right.

I'm not sure exactly what Bow was getting at with the markings he made above, but it could be that he wants me to write more books for children and fewer novels.

Bow Helps Proof "Ping & the Snirkelly People"

Even though there is still snow on the ground, we are no  longer snowed in. Sword went to spend the night at a friend's house, and encouraged by the example of the friend's mother who was able to drive all the way down our driveway, I took the opportunity when Bow went to sleep last night to pick up my mail from the post office box and to restock my store of apples, bananas and grapes. I finally have the proof of Ping & the Snirkelly People.

When I showed it to Bow this morning, he was very interested. He looked at it for a while, then he took me to the glass and spelled: "It's a big book."

"Yes," I said. "It is big. Do you think people will want to buy it?"

"Yes," he spelled. Well, if Bow thinks so, then we might have a chance!

Bow asks for his ball

This morning, Bow and Lawrence were outside in the outer pen, and Lawrence was reading to Bow about King David. Suddenly Bow went to the door, indicating he wanted to go inside. Lawrence went inside with him, and Bow took him straight to the glass and spelled: "I want to play with my ball."

"Do you want to play with your ball outside?" Lawrence asked.

"Yes," Bow spelled. "Outside."

Lawrence brought the brown basketball for Bow to play with outside. We're not sure what made Bow think of his ball just then. This is an unusual incident, because usually when Bow is outside he enjoys playing with what is there, and he never takes someone back in just to ask for another toy.