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As a beginning reader I was unable to hear the difference between the words \u201cmagician\u201d and \u201cmusician.\u201d Why, I wondered, with the apparently infinite combinations of letters and sounds, would we use the same collection to describe these two differing occupations? When I first approached the door of my first-grade classroom, trying to hide behind my mother, my teacher Mrs. Walton spoke to me with a gentle smile. \u201cCome on in here, Evelyn Jervey!\u201d she said. I looked at the bright posters on the walls, and it seemed that the procession of illustrated letters might go on forever.<\/p>\n
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My title for this little bird-walk comes from an episode of the Netflix series \u201cThe Last Kingdom.\u201d In this episode, the Vikings have invaded King Alfred\u2019s palace and are making a mess as they were wont to do. The character based on King Guthrum, however, has fistfuls of Alfred\u2019s scrolls, and he says, \u201cThis is words without sound; this is voices without people. I am going to learn how to use this magic!\u201d* Fast forward a millennium or so, and this magic is available to almost everybody, and few are inclined to sneer in any serious way.<\/p>\n
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When I was growing up, my Aunt Evelyn would take us five kids to the library once a month in her 1960\u2019s-era Volkswagen beetle. Sisters Mary and Laura and cousin Byrd would sit in the back, cousin Charley in the front seat, and I being the smallest would sit on the brake between the two front seats. The girls would sing Joan Baez songs with great enthusiasm; I imagine we each had our own version of the high notes. I did used to wonder why Aunt Evelyn kept the windows rolled up when we stopped at traffic lights.<\/p>\n
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At the library we could each check out three new books after we turned in the three from last month. The only fees that I could see being collected were pennies for late books; how did they keep the lights on? I offered one time to keep some books past the due date if that would help with cash flow. My aunt and the librarian gazed at me in loving amazement.<\/p>\n
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My house today is well-supplied with books; what on earth do people do all day in houses that have none? Well, maybe they read blogs.<\/p>\n
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Reference<\/p>\n
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*Netflix Series, \u201cThe Last Kingdom.\u201d Season One, Episode Seven.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As a beginning reader I was unable to hear the difference between the words \u201cmagician\u201d and \u201cmusician.\u201d Why, I wondered, with the apparently infinite combinations of letters and sounds, would we use the same collection to describe these two differing occupations? When I first approached the door of my first-grade classroom, trying to hide behind […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[21,20,57,56],"class_list":["post-86","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-musings-about-language-and-life","tag-language","tag-magic","tag-netflix","tag-the-last-kingdom"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions\/214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=86"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=86"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}