Chapter 1
Callie liked meandering down the rows of the farmer’s market.
Each week, there were a few vendors she’d consistently visit, but she liked to show interest in other people’s products as well. It made her uncomfortable to walk past the booths she didn’t care about and avoid eye contact with the people eagerly waiting for someone to buy—so she’d at least give everyone a friendly smile or politely comment on an item at their booth.
“Ooh, that necklace is beautiful,” she’d say to a friend of a friend who made jewelry.
However, this tendency to take her time drove her family crazy. After years of begging her to move along, David and the kids had learned to go off on their own. They’d get all their shopping done and then sit in the shade eating shaved ice while they waited for her. If Callie had known just how quickly those years would go by, she would’ve made more of an effort to spend the mornings with her family, even if it meant she wouldn’t be able to move at her own pace.
Nowadays, it was rare for anyone to come with her to the farmer’s market. Every once in a while, David would ask her to pick him up a few items, but it’d been years since he joined her.
But that morning, she enjoyed the company of David and Sasha who were forced to walk slowly due to the cumbersome new stroller Callie had insisted on buying—preventing them from leaving Callie in the dust.
Even still, Callie ended up at the back of the pack, but she didn’t mind. She liked lingering behind and listening to the casual conversation David and Sasha were having. David had mentioned something about an article he’d read on homeschooling, and they were discussing the pros and cons.
“I’d never homeschool Dot,” Sasha said as they walked a few paces ahead of Callie.
“Why’s that?”
“I’m not smart enough.”
“Oh, don’t say that! You’re smart!”
She shrugged. “I’m not saying I’mdumb,I’m just not smart enough to give her the education she should have. I’d be too worried about missing important details, forgetting things, or just messing up... I mean, there’s a reason teachers have to have college degrees...”
“That’s true, but in the article, they outlined a bunch of curriculums that are available on the internet nowadays. So, it’s not like you’d be teaching without any guidelines.”
“Maybe, but I’m still not sure that’s a good idea,” Sasha said. “My grandma used to say you only really understand something if you can teach it. By that logic, the reverse is true, right?”
“How’s that?”
“Well, if I can’t teach her without the help of a textbook or the internet, then that means I don’t really understand what I’m saying. It’s like a blind person leading a blind person. And Dot definitely deserves better than that.”
“Oh, I’m not arguing,” he clarified. “Really. I don’t have a strong opinion either way, I was just pointing out that it seems like homeschooling has changed a lot since I was a kid. Back in the day, there was a boy who came to our school in 8th grade after being homeschooled his entire life, and he didn’t even know how to spell his own name. It was pretty sad.”
“See! That’s what I’m afraid of.”
“Right, but I don’t think that happens a lot these days.” He laughed. “Or I just read a really biased article....” He looked at Sasha and smiled. “That’s what my son would say, anyway. He’s always accusing me of believing too much of what I read online.”
“Can’t blame you,” Sasha said with a sigh. “I do the same. But if I can successfully teach anything to Dot, it’ll be that she can’t trust something just because someone online said it. Honestly, I’ll tell her to be less trusting in general.”
Callie found this to be a very telling statement, but she kept her thoughts to herself. If David had any feelings about Sasha’s cautious mentality, he didn’t vocalize them. “Well, for the record, I do think that it’s a good idea to send Dot to a normal school when the time comes. She’s already such a social baby, it’d be a shame for her to not be surrounded by kids her own age.”
Sasha laughed. “That’s true. But we’re talking as if homeschooling would even be an option for me.”
“Is it not?”
“No way!” She scoffed. “Only rich people can homeschool. Do you have any idea how much extra time and money you have to have to keep your kids home with you all day? I’m a single parent who’s going to have to work a full-time job once Dot’s old enough to enroll. There’s not gonna be any time to teach her everything.”
David paused and shot a glance over his shoulder at Callie, as if he thought she was going to chime in for some reason. However, she didn’t have anything to say on this matter and only shrugged.
“Right,” David continued. “There is a financial factor for sure. It’s funny how the article barely touched on that.” He chuckled. “Guess that’s another reason to assume it was pretty biased.”
“When we get home, maybe you can look up an article that’s on the opposite side. To have a more... balanced view... you know?” Sasha said with a nonchalant tone.
He grinned at this. “That’s a great idea! Oh, but speaking of jobs, did you ever end up applying the bookstore? Callie mentioned that Kate offered you a temporary gig there.”
“I’m still putzing around with my resume,” Sasha admitted. “I know I’m wasting a lot of time, but I’m trying to get it perfect. I just wish I had more things to list under ‘job experience’ or ‘education.’ And before you suggest that I just need to pad it a little, trust me, I’ve already done all the padding possible.”
