LITTLE BLUE TRUCK (2008) is a new children's book to me. Words by Alice Schertle, pictures by Jill McElmurry, we learn the sounds of farm animals - oink, moo, quack, among others - also the beep of a little blue truck and the HONK! of a big dump truck. The big honking dump truck blows by the little truck and animals. "I haven't got time to pass the day with every duck along the way!"

...Until he is stuck over his axles in the mud. It takes the combined effort of little blue truck and the rural menagerie to push big truck out of the mud and send him on his honking way. "'Thanks little brother,' said the Dump to Blue. 'You helped me and they helped you. Now I see a lot depends on a helping hand from a few good friends.'"

(Subtle... but a life long learning many of us adults have trouble getting: the big, strong also need the help of the small seemingly weak.)

Conference Communication staffer Lyn Cosby loaned LITTLE BIG TRUCK to Sandy O'Kelley and me in the South Central District office. I think for a couple of reasons. It is the very first children's book given in our Annual Conference's Ministry With the Poor initiative the Bazillion Book Drive. It came from our SCD Canterbury Church member Christin Dedmon. AND... likely because it is not a well kept secret that I am a bit bonkers about books.

Rev. Sally Allocca is our conference Ministry With the Poor Operational Team member overseeing the BBD. Anyone knowing Sally knows when she takes on a mission, she will not let it, or you, go until it is accomplished. In Sally's marching orders, I mean, memo to our SC District team, she reminds us how critical books and reading readiness are for children. If a child is not on reading grade level by 3rd grade, chances of high school graduation plummet. 80% of children in under-resourced communities are below grade level. Thus... begins the defeating cycle of the poverty of low aspirations.

Faith is first caught before it is taught is an often repeated truth. Called basic trust, faith begins early with the caring consistency a baby, toddler, young child, kindergartner, elementary schooler experience in the people, that is, relations around him/her. In the context of those trusted relationships, emotional intelligence (esteem for self and respect for others) begins. In the chemistry of child of God-human development, book pictures seen, and stories heard, from trusted ones begins the process of intellectual competence.

In dawn's early light, I rummaged around our house for the remnants of children's books Dianne and I read to Ben and Anna, our grand-kid-like

nephew and niece, in the 1990's; books we read to our kids in the 1970's. And I ran through my mind book time with my mother, grandmother, Sunday school and elementary school teachers. Like... Mrs. Woodall, Mrs. Waggoner, and Miss Carey (a Bush School teacher my mother also had).

The connectionalism of the United Methodist Church is one of the means of grace-conduits of God's love to us and the world. The connection - among the 703 churches of the Annual Conference, through the 8 Districts, and the churches (50 in ours) with and within each other - will result in the giving of a bazillion books. A great list of titles is forth coming, to churches and agencies to be identified in the process. Stay tuned for more information!

In the meantime, thank God for books. The book and books of the Bible -though John says it would take a bazillion books to record it all about Jesus (John 21.25 Morgan Unauthorized Version). I am resisting listing my list. But I suggest you recall the books, including Bible stories, read to you by people who cared about you...and books you read to people you care about.

Kids with too much as well as kids with not enough, each in their own way, need the respect for self and others that begins with the relationships and information of books. As I read through LITTLE BLUE TRUCK, I was reminded we are all remedial students of life. We older kids still get a bit scared of the wild things that go bump in the night...and life. No one can live our lives for us. But whether we are a big honker or a little beeper, none of us can do our living and dying without help. People and books are both mirrors to God's gift of our life and windows to God's gift of life to all others.

P.S. I would love to hear a title or two of beloved books read to and/or by you - perhaps your nomination for or affirmation of the evolving list.