One of the perks of living in a southern state is the pride people take in their food. I grew up in the North where the food was secondary to the pomp and ceremony.

Here in the South, what’s on the plate is the star of the show, and it seems people south of the Mason-Dixon line have their own feelings about how to prepare the best Southern meal.

Growing up in Louisiana, knowing the proper way to cook Cajun food was much more important than knowing how to drive. It’s probably a requirement for anyone living in Louisiana to own a cast-iron pot as it’s the only cookware capable of turning out an acceptable roux, the backbone of almost every Cajun dish.

For those new to Southern cuisine, a roux is a mixture of flour and oil, cooked over a medium heat until it turns a caramel color. Ask any Cajun cook how to make something, and the first thing he or she will say is “make a roux.”

Right up there with mastering the art of making a roux is learning how to cook crawfish. In Yankee cooking magazines, they refer to these scrumptious crustaceans as “crayfish.” Use that word down South, and you’ll be tossed out along with your Schlitz beer.

Every Cajun cook worth his or her Tony Chachere’s has a secret recipe for cooking crawfish to perfection and all claim their way is the best way.

Some cooks cover the live crawfish with salt to purge them while others skip that step. Some add extra salt and red pepper to the crawfish seasoning packets right when the water starts to boil while others dump the seasonings in at the end.

There’s the debated method of throwing ice water on the crawfish when they’re finished boiling or just letting them steep in the seasoned water until they’re tender and juicy. Some cooks throw red potatoes and corn on the cob in with the crawfish, and there’s always heated arguments about the exact right time to add those ingredients.

But Louisiana doesn’t have the market cornered when it comes to heated debates around the pot. When we moved to Texas, we found Southern pride in preparing a barbecue dinner. All Texas chefs worth their own cooking rig guard the secret to their sauce more vigorously than guarding the secret to Coca Cola.

Some Texas chefs cook their brisket all night long while others use pecan wood or beer in the smoker to give the meat a sweet, moist taste.

Some add the barbecue sauce while the meat’s cooking while others wait until the last few minutes to completely smother the ribs and chicken while they’re on the pit. I’ve had barbecue cooked every kind of way, and it’s all fabulous.

The best part of any Southern meal – no matter if it’s cooked in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi or Arkansas – is sitting down with friends and kinfolk to enjoy the fruits of one’s labor. Once the iced tea glasses are filled, many families bow their heads and say a blessing for the bounty on the table.

And right up there with enjoying the food is enjoying the conversation as Southerners love to argue politics, grumble about the high price of college football tickets and then go back for seconds.

Especially if seconds include another platter of barbecue ribs, a fresh mound of hot, spicy crawfish or that last sliver of pecan pie topped off with some homemade whipped cream.

Sweetie, when you’re lucky enough to be a Southerner, life doesn’t get much better.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

With windshield wipers waging a losing battle against the driving rain, I kept wondering why I hadn’t left for Louisiana the night before.

My theory was it would be easier to navigate across Houston traffic on a calm Saturday morning instead of a frantic Friday afternoon, but I hadn’t counted on a powerful rain system to come roaring along Interstate 10.

Still, I didn’t begrudge the trip as I was going to spend Mother’s Day with my mom in Baton Rouge. Driving across Houston, I found myself marveling at the city’s downtown skyscrapers, so majestic against that gray sky.

Once I left the crowded freeways, the fields between Houston and the state line were calming in spite of the miserable weather. The open rice fields along the interstate were filled with water, and hundreds of birds were swooping and diving, hoping to find breakfast.

Driving over the Atchafalaya Basin is one of my favorite parts of a trip to Baton Rouge because the area is truly unique.

The Basin is home to thousands of varieties of wildlife, from graceful herons to stealthy alligators. I saw dozens of boats out on the waters, and I thought about my dad and uncles and all the afternoons they spent in the Basin.

Those memories kept me company until I arrived at my mom’s, happy to be out of the rain. While in Baton Rouge, I was lucky to attend my great nephew’s graduation party, and familiar faces and people I’d never met before quickly blended together.

As an added bonus, Brennan’s family served up hot crawfish all afternoon. I can’t remember the last time I had fresh, boiled crawfish, and those little mudbugs were even more delicious than I’d remembered.

It wasn’t long before I had a nice mountain of empty crawfish shells in front of me, and I diligently worked to dig out the tender white meat from the claws.

Everybody has their own method for extracting crawfish meat from the shell, and I relied on my Cajun uncles’ brilliant suggestion to crack the shell and then use the sharp end of the claw to dig the meat out.

On the way back to Texas, I stopped at Pat’s in Henderson for some fried alligator for my daughter-in-law. Driving down the bayou road to Pat’s is a true slice of Louisiana as one passes quaint houses, people riding horses along the levee and boats and trailers in front yards.

Because it was Mother’s Day, the front hostess told me I couldn’t get a dinner to go, but the reservations clerk leaned over and told me to check in the bar. I went in and explained the order was for my daughter in law who’s expecting this winter, and the waitress looked at me for a long minute.

“Cher, don’t you worry. I’ll fix her right up,” she said. Ten minutes later, she returned with a heaping helping of fried alligator bits and wished me a safe trip.

When I stopped at Novrazsky’s in Orange, Texas for a late lunch, the server threw in a free drink, wishing me a happy Mother’s Day. The sandwich was stuffed with fresh meats and vegetables and I silently thanked the staff for going the extra mile for me.

No matter what state one lives in, there are beautiful sights to see – the majestic mountains in Colorado, the mysterious swamps of Louisiana, the wide open spaces of Texas.

While those are memorable, the people one meets while there and along the way are what makes a state unforgettable. I encountered wonderfully kind people on my journey, and for that, this was a Mother’s Day I’ll long remember.
 
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

I settled down in my seat on the front row, waiting for the high school choir’s spring concert to begin. One of the perks of being the designated photographer for events is getting to sit up front and often tip-toeing around behind the scenes.

From that vantage point, one sees the preparation, nervousness and frantic activity that goes on before the curtain goes up, and it’s always amazing how poised young people appear when they’re on the stage performing.

As a parent in the audience, I think I was probably more nervous than my boys before a performance, starting with pre-school.

Over 20 years ago, I remember sitting in the audience at St. John’s School for Little Children, nervously waiting for a pre-school performance where our youngest boy was a ferocious, yet cuddly, lion.

All the parents were snapping away with their cameras as our boys and girls sang – a little off key – and growled and roared as jungle animals for their end-of-the-year performance. It wasn’t Shakespeare, but we thought they were absolutely wonderful.

Then we moved on to elementary school, and I’m still in awe of teachers who can take 25 first graders, somehow teach them speeches, songs and dance moves and then coax them onto a stage to perform for an audience.

In junior high, our middle son decided to try out for “Little Orphan Annie,” and he earned the role of the swaggering Daddy Warbucks, a little bit of a surprise as our son was a quiet, shy adolescent.

When he confidently marched out on to center stage, bellowing orders to the staff, I jumped back in my seat. I’d never seen this side of him, wondering how in the world his theater teacher, Ms. Wanda Harrell, coaxed that level of confidence out of him.

As he sang a solo to Annie, I quietly cried with pride, joy and appreciation for the wonderful opportunity he’d been given to express himself artistically and to be part of an ensemble that created magic on the stage.

Our youngest son was also interested in performing; and when my rebel landed the part of the conservative father in “Bye, Bye Birdie,” I laughed because he was definitely playing someone out of character. But when he sang to his stage children, I cried again, watching him push himself farther than he’d thought possible.

Both boys were active in theater at Austin High School, and although they didn’t have leads, they loved being part of the theater family, headed up by teachers Brad Cummons and Tress Kurzym. From there, they learned to love the behind-the-scenes aspect of a concert and live theater, connected to high school through the arts.

I remembered all those concerts and plays as I watched the teens on stage at Terry High. For this one night, they were part of a larger ensemble, expressing their feelings through song.

Choral director Rhonda Klutts coaxed music from the hearts of over 165 students at that concert, and their faces radiated with joy. Some will never sing on a stage again, but many will, either with a church, a community group or professionally.

For some, they’ll decide to add acting to singing, and their high school or college theater director will convince them to step into a fictional character’s shoes, just as fine arts teachers have been doing since the one-room schoolhouse days.

A love of music and the fine arts stays with youngsters their entire lives. That spark was ignited because a teacher encouraged them to step out in front of the lights and take a chance.

Dim the lights, please.

The magic’s about to begin.

This column originally appeared in The Fort Bend Herald.

Looking at the newspaper last week, I saw the list of new television shows the networks are planning to cancel. Viewership is down, so shows launched over the past few months that aren’t performing as well as trashy reality shows will probably get the axe.

Although there are tons of reasons why a show gets canned, the primary culprit is bad writing. So when a terrific story comes along, it’s gold – think Huck Finn, Tom Sawyer, Atticus Finch, Sherlock Holmes and Peter Pan.

A great story can make up for bad acting, poor lighting and cheesy sets. Readers and audiences will stay up late, book or Kindle in hand, tune in week after week and hang on every word when the story’s an intriguing one.

It’s easy, though, for good storytelling to fall by the wayside as we look for ways to trim corners and speed up life. We want the abridged edition, and many are only willing to sit still for highlights at the top of the hour or a few lines that scroll across the top of our computer or television screen.

Good stories take their time, and good storytellers understand the fine line between drawing out a story to have more time in the limelight and letting the story gently unfold.

Great stories lay a foundation and build on it word by word. Great storytellers understand magic happens through those words, and their job is to dispense those words with emotion, great gestures and the enchanting whisper.

They never forget that the story line comes before the way they pronounce their words or the timbre of their voice.

The truth is great stories allow us to see ourselves in the tale, and they inspire us to be a little bit nicer, a little bit braver or a little more aware of what’s around us. They capture our imagination from the first few words, hold us in their spell and then leave us hungry for more at the end.

My grandmother was a terrific storyteller. Her voice would rise and fall as she talked about her pampered childhood in Lebanon, her and my grandfather’s tumultuous path to America and their lean days during the Depression.

The basic story was fascinating – growing up on a silk farm and how, as young newlyweds, she and my grandfather had to prove my grandfather’s innocence when someone accused him of being a bigamist. Turned out a girl who’d liked my grandfather found out he’d married, so she decided to try and ruin his honeymoon.

She embellished the story every time, fine tuning it as writers do today on a computer or a laptop. I’d sit next to her on the couch at night, waiting impatiently for the tale to begin. She never disappointed, and I’d make her tell me those stories again and again.

I thought about her the other night when my granddaughter picked up a spiral notebook and a pencil and began scribbling on a page. After a few minutes, she said she’d written a story and wanted to read it to me.

She began with “once upon a time” and “read” me the story she’d written. Her voice was filled with pauses, whispers and sound effects, and I could tell she was enjoying the telling of the story as much as having a captive audience.

After a few minutes, she paused, smiled and said “the end.” I clapped, realizing she has a true gift for both writing and telling a story, just like her ancestors before her.

And, in the end, that’s what keeps all of us connected from generation to generation – our story.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

As much as I hate to admit it, there are times when I do something dumb and then have to slap my forehead and say “duh.”

Holding my keys in my hand while looking for them constitutes as dumb. Going to the grocery store to get eggs, coming home with $65 worth of groceries and no eggs is another one, as is pouring a cup of coffee and realizing I forgot to put grounds in the basket.

But when the electricity goes off in our garage and I can’t find the reset button that’s right in front of my face, well that ratchets stupidity up to a whole new level for me.

Not being able to accomplish relatively simple tasks goes back to my childhood. I remember the first time the chain came off my bicycle. An hour later, covered with black grease, I still couldn’t fix my bike.

My brother came along and slipped the chain back on in less than two minutes.

As a teenager, I had an Impressionist wall in my bedroom because I stood on a folding chair to paint the moulding around the top of the room. Instead of having a blue border, I had a white wall decorated with a huge splat of cornflower blue paint.

I also backed our car into the house one afternoon. Oh, I can say I was distracted by my baby brother or I was a young driver and couldn’t judge distances, but the hard, cold truth is that I backed our Ford sedan into our house – that wasn’t moving – and cracked the sheetrock from the ceiling to the floor.

Then there was the evening I put Dawn liquid detergent in the dishwasher after running out of powdered cleaner. I never bothered to read the dishwasher directions, but when mountains of suds came spewing out the sides of the Kenmore, I learned my lesson.

So when I came home from work this week and the garage door didn’t open, I thought the power was off in the house. I went inside and realized only the garage was without power.

Growing up in an older house, I knew to check the breakers, but none seemed to be tripped. At this point in time, I did what any intuitive person would do – I called an expert. That expert just happens to be my husband who was taking a needed break out in the country.

He asked me to look around the garage for an outlet similar to the one in our bathroom that trips from time to time. I didn’t see one but I told him one of the breakers had to be tripped.

I described the electrical panels to him and checked all of the switches to see if any had tripped. Knowing I must be missing something, I took pictures of the panels and emailed them to him so he could see what I was seeing.

Nothing looked tripped, but my husband decided to come home in case something deeper was wrong.

Frustrated at not being able to figure out the problem, I stomped around the house for a bit and then decided to go back to the garage one more time and look around.

That’s when I saw the electrical outlet with the ground fault interrupter.

It was right below the electrical panel.

With one press of the trip button, the power was back on. That move took less than three seconds, the same amount of time it took me to slap my forehead.

Am I feeling like the dumbest person on the planet?

Oh yeah.
 
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

In the morning, my clock radio clicks on at 6 a.m. A half hour later, I’m walking out the door, headed to work.

Along the way, I pass dozens of cars, all heading someplace other than home. Almost 12 hours later, we’re all back in our vehicles, dueling on the roadway for a better position in the fast lane.

On the weekend, it’s tackle the mountain of laundry, change the sheets on the bed, clean the bathrooms and then fight our way through the grocery store, a list in one hand, coupons in the other.

In between, we’re juggling bills, sorting mismatched socks and hoping the squealing washing machine makes it through one more payday.

Driving through the rain on my way home, my mood soured as trucks sprayed water all over my windshield. But then the rain slacked up and a pale rainbow appeared over the horizon.

I almost missed that heavenly sight, too absorbed in thinking about what to cook for dinner and the list of chores waiting for me.

Suddenly I realized I was wasting a great deal of time whining about what I had to do and the lack of time to do anything I wanted to do. So the next morning, when the “I-have-to-do-this” thoughts hit me, I turned off the car radio and rolled the windows down.

The sweet smell of spring was too fragrant to ignore and the sound of the wind outside was a much prettier melody than anything I’d hear from the speakers in my car.

While putting new sheets on the bed a few days later, I made myself stop calling what I was doing a chore.

Instead, I thought about my grandmother’s back yard and how we’d run in between the sheets as they dried on the clothes line. We’d wrap the sheets around our shoulders, and the smell of sheets crisp and dry from a laundry line is forever etched in my memory.

With that thought in my head, I sat down in the rocker we have in the corner, a chair we’ve had for years, but one I seldom sit in any more. I leaned back and looked out the window, remembering I used to sit in that chair and rock the boys when they were babies.

As they were going to sleep, I’d hold them up close to my cheek, their breathing so quick, their scent so sweet. Many evenings, I’d rock them long past when they were asleep, savoring those moments.

But then they were toddlers, too busy for mom’s lap and a mom too busy picking up after them. Then they were wild boys who morphed into teens and then they were gone. The chair stayed in the corner year after year, slowly becoming a collection point for blankets and tossed-off clothes.

But today, I sat down and rocked.

And thought leisurely thoughts.

And, bit by bit, relaxed.

Responsibilities were far away and memories came flooding back of unhurried moments in my life – afternoons on the beach watching the boys running in and out of the surf, Sundays in the back yard listening to my dad spin tall tales while he barbecued chicken and relaxing in the kitchen alongside my mom, her peeling an apple in one, long unbroken strand while we seemed to talk about nothing in particular but said everything important.

Those unhurried moments, the ones we rush through, are the ones that last much longer than a clean bathroom or a pile of matched socks.

I just have to remember to roll down the windows and let the wind blow where she will.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

One summer while on vacation, I saw an advertisement that a restored B-52 bomber plane from World War II would be on display at the local airport. I always wondered about these historic planes, so I was thrilled to have the opportunity to actually climb inside an aircraft used in battle over 50 years ago.

The interior was cramped, and the floor opened up on either side of a narrow walkway to let bombs drop. I could only imagine terrified young men standing there, gripping machine guns, while pilots dive bombed over cities and the countryside.

My appreciation grew by leaps and bounds through interviews I’ve had with veterans over the years. I didn’t think it would be possible for my admiration for those men and women to grow.

Until I read “Unbroken” by Laura Hillenbrand.

“Unbroken” chronicles the life of Louis Zamperini. A rebellious young scamp, Zamperini was on his way to the 1936 Berlin Olympics, fit and talented enough to break the four-minute mile, when World War II erupted.

Zamperini joined the Air Corps and soon found himself right in the middle of the fighting. In May, 1943, he and a crew took off on a troublesome B-24 plane. Over the Pacific Ocean, the plane failed and smashed into the waters.

Thus began Zamperini’s first ordeal – floating aimlessly on the ocean for 47 days, fighting off vicious sharks and starvation. When he and two of his comrades were picked up by the enemy, he weighed 67 pounds.

But that wasn’t the worst. Zamperini was taken to a Japanese prisoner of war camp where he was beaten, starved and tortured for almost two years. He suffered through dysentery, malnutrition and seeing his friends and comrades brutally murdered and tortured.

The worst, though, was Mutsuhiro Watanabe “The Bird,” a savage, brutal Japanese guard who seemed to take pleasure in torturing all the prisoners but none more so than Zamperini.

“The Bird” not only beat the former Olympian but delighted in making Zamperini’s life as miserable as possible, both physically and mentally.

But Zamperini did not let “The Bird” break him, refusing to bow, even when The Bird repeatedly smashed him in the head with a metal belt buckle. Zamperini refused to give up when he was transferred to another POW camp and found out The Bird had transferred as well.

But the hate Zamperini had for that guard kept him going; and he vowed if he ever got out of the camp, he’d kill him with his bare hands. When the Allies freed the prisoners, Zamperini – disease-ridden, weak and malnourished – was elated but never forgot the evil Japanese guard.

For years, constant thoughts of killing The Bird drove him to drink and almost lose his wife and family. It wasn’t until 1949 when he reluctantly attended a Billy Graham revival that Zamperini was able to finally let go of that burning hatred.

Zamperini subsequently opened the nonprofit Victory Boys Camp, a place that helped lost boys. At night, he’d sit around a campfire, telling the boys about the war and how he finally achieved inner peace. He also traveled the world, speaking about his experiences and receiving awards and honors.

In his 60’s Zamperini was still giving speeches. In his 70’s, he was still running. When he was in his 80’s, he was skateboarding. And when he was in his 90’s, he was skiing down mountains – always with a smile on his face.

One of the greatest moments of Zamperini’s life came in 1998 when he was asked to carry the Olympic torch through the streets of Nagano, Japan, the site of that hellish POW camp. His journey had evolved from despair into tranquility.

Zamperini’s words to Hillenbrand and ultimately her readers reflect what I’ve heard in the quiet voices of veterans I’ve had the privilege of interviewing.

They survived because they chose to bend, not break.
 
This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

When I was in high school, most of us trying to avoid gym class took typing. I remember walking into Ms. Thomas’ room and seeing gray manual Royal typewriters on every desk.

Over the course of my junior year, I learned how to type, pressing down hard on those round keys and trying not to get purple carbon paper all over my clothes.

I was pretty quick on that typewriter and was soon up to about 85 words a minute, mostly because if you typed that fast, you’d get an A in the class.

When I went to college, my parents gave me a small portable typewriter so I could type research papers, handy even though the thin metal bars with the letters on the end were always getting tangled.

Luckily, electric typewriters, IBM Selectrics to be exact, hit the market. The Selectric featured a round metal typeball that made changing the font possible, and we no longer had to press down on the keys like we were pounding nails in a board.

My college typing teacher said if we could type 100 words a minute, we could get out of class three weeks early. That was a carrot impossible to resist, so I practiced until I was zipping along fast enough to watch television for an extra hour every day instead of sitting in typing class.

And then came computers. They could move entire paragraphs around, automatically fix spelling mistakes and print out a beautiful, error-free paper. Those old manual and electric typewriters quickly became dinosaurs on the top shelves of our closets.

Just when we thought life couldn’t get any easier, along came text messaging. After years of zipping along on keyboards, I should be a fast texter.

Wrong. I’m the slowest texter around. A text message from me is usually less than five words because I just can’t get the hang of texting.

I’ve got a lot of excuses. I blame the slick surface of my iPhone as there aren’t buttons to press, unlike a typewriter or keyboard. I also blame prescriptive text for “going to store” somehow getting translated into “Great to Steal.”

Maybe it’s because I’m still trying to figure out how to text with my thumbs that I fumble around for a simple five-word reply to a text. I’m one of those archaic one-finger texters, and it takes me forever to answer a text message question.

I don’t understand why people who have a lot to say don’t just call me on my cell. Talking is a lot easier than texting, but texting is more private than talking on a cell phone in a crowded room.

That’s true but when I’m a slow-as-molasses texter, I seldom get my point across before the conversation’s over. Another problem with texting is it’s difficult to explain a mix up.

One night, I got a text from my niece. I replied to her, I thought, and then went through 10 minutes of back-and-forth texting with someone on her mass text messaging distribution list until the ditzy woman finally figured out who I was and apo

logized.

Hanging up the phone is a lot faster than texting an explanation; and once you’ve hung up the phone, that pesky conversation is over unlike texting that can go on forever.

As time goes on, however, I am getting faster at texting although my inner grammarian voice still cringes at the abbreviations. But at least when someone asks if I’m exercising, I can say yes – my fingers and thumbs.
 
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

(Many thanks to wonderful friends Bob and Denise for inviting me and driving up to Austin! I had a BLAST!)

When the call came from the stage to join the conga line, my friend immediately jumped up and headed to the front of the theater. Hanging back, I watched as she waved her hands over her head, a radiant smile on her face as she danced her way around the front of the theater.

Onstage was an internationally known band, Pink Martini, and until a week ago, I had no idea who they were. By the end of the night, I became a devoted fan.

The leaders of Pink Martini are Thomas Lauderdale and China Forbes who were college friends. Late at night, they’d collaborate, Lauderdale on the piano with Forbes singing torch songs.

The two were fluent in a variety of languages and musical styles, and they began writing songs. Once they started performing, they were immediately embraced by audiences, beginning in Portland and then growing to a loyal fan base around the world.

Their music ranges from Brazilian sambas to sassy French songs. Forbes easily maneuvers her rich, silky voice through 1920s torch songs as evenly as Japanese love songs, and the extremely talented musicians in Pink Martini move right along with her.

Forget pre-taped music and outrageously dressed performers. Pink Martini’s

musicians were all wearing coats and ties, and coordinating the entire affair was Lauderdale, his love of the music causing him to literally bounce off the piano bench with every note.

And that’s exactly what he did while playing to a full house in the beautiful studio where the show “Austin City Limits” is filmed.

Now in its 35th year, ACL is the longest-running music series in American television history. They began in 1974 with PBS, and singers from Willie Nelson to The Allman Brothers Band to George Strait have graced the stage over the years.

What sets Austin City Limits apart from other shows is the attitude of the audience. These are folks who come to hear great music without any smoke or mirrors, and they weren’t disappointed the night Pink Martini performed.

As a special treat, the great-grandchildren of Maria and Georg Von Trapp appeared on stage, and the musical genes run quite deep in that family. It was amazing to watch these young adults sing in front of 2,000 people, harmonizing like professionals.

More amazing was the way the members of Pink Martini welcomed a new generation to the stage. But even with the aura of being descendants of the von Trapps, the real stars of the night were the members of Pink Martini, especially lead singer China Forbes.

She can sing in 15 different languages, and she crooned love songs in Peruvian, French, Portuguese and Chinese.

Although I couldn’t understand a word she was singing, the meaning was unmistakable – allow this music to seep into your soul. Lose yourself in the notes and slowly fade into a place where the outside world is thousands of miles away.

At the end of the performance, Forbes asked everybody to make a conga line, and half the patrons were immediately out of their seats and dancing around the theater.

I watched my friend, her hands up over her head, sashaying up and down the aisles, and then I noticed she was leading the way.

Her smile was as bright as the lights in the catwalk, and I realized something while watching her. Music has the ability to transform our world and make us believe that even if a boy named Eugene forgets to call, happiness remains right around the corner.

It’s within your grasp. All you have to do is get out of the chair and dance.
 
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

Sitting in the back of the room, I watched in amazement as 30 energetic toddlers jumped up and down, clapped their hands and twirled around. It was Toddler Time, and the room was hopping.

This lively gathering was thanks to the Fort Bend County Libraries. At all of their branches, they offer a variety of programs for youngsters, from Toddler Time for ages 1-3, Story Time for ages 3-6, after-school programs for children in grades 1-5 and programs for pre-teens and teens.

When my boys were young, we participated in a variety of library programs, but I didn’t visit the toddler programs until my granddaughter came along. Last summer, we visited the George Memorial Library for Story Time, and my granddaughter had a blast.

We met in the large meeting room, and a friendly librarian read and acted out half a dozen books for the children, put on an interactive puppet show and sang songs.

At the end, she gave all the children an arts and craft project to complete, and instantly everybody was on the floor coloring, gluing and showing off their masterpieces.

The children readily shared their supplies, listened as moms softly read stories aloud and skipped and danced around the room, singing the songs the librarian had taught them.

As a bonus, I met other moms, as well as a few grandparents, looking for something fun yet educational during the hot summer months.

So it was a pleasant surprise when my granddaughter and I stepped into the Bob Lutts Library in Fulshear during Spring Break, arriving just as Toddler Time was starting.

The conference room was filled with laughter and youngsters crawling around, jumping up and down and some clinging to mom for dear life.

But when the librarian began to sing, all eyes were glued on her and then everybody who knew the song joined in. At the end, there was spontaneous applause and then quiet as the librarian read a book aloud.

Just when the toddlers’ attention was beginning to wane, she brought out a circus-like tent as wide as the room.

Everybody grabbed a section of the outer edge, and we began waving the tent up and down. Most of the children, my granddaughter included, crawled underneath the tent and squealed with delight as we slowly fanned that colorful material up and down over the children, all of us singing and laughing.

We’re told the children of today need television, expensive gadgets, computers, tutors and hand-held games in order to stay ahead of the ever-widening learning curve.

But in less than an hour, when allowed to interact with each other in a hands-on, lively environment, a room full of toddlers, as well as the adults with them, learned together.

Many thanks to the Fort Bend County Libraries for staffing and introducing these programs to our young learners. Because of their willingness to sing silly songs and lead discussion groups with our adolescents and teens, we remind our future leaders that the library is not only fun, it’s a safe and engaging place to connect, either through face-to-face discussions or in the pages of a book.

And because the Fort Bend County Libraries provide programs for adults wishing to learn how to crochet, knit, file their taxes or care for a loved one struggling with Alzheimer’s, we’re reminded that learning never stops.

So visit the library today. And take a youngster along. You’ll be amazed how rewarding life can be while watching a child make an invisible itsy-bitsy spider crawl up an imaginary water spout.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.