Our childhood shapes who we are and how we think about ourselves, this is an undeniable fact. Sometimes as kids, we start to think “I can’t do that”, because it requires math or maybe it requires a lot of reading and writing. We put ourselves in boxes and unfortunately we have a very narrow understanding of what it means to be “smart”. My grandpa wasn’t a great student in the traditional sense, in fact some may say he was a very bad student. He once told me it was a mistake he graduated from high school and middle school because of how seldom he attended class. He was focused on surviving, his childhood wasn’t easy. Yet, when I worked with him at the store I saw his genius. I saw how he read an invoice and instantly calculated profit margins in his head. I saw that he recognized missing payments/merchandise almost immediately. He recalled orders years ago from dozens of vendors. I witnessed his empathy and charisma as he helped his customers. Every problem the store encountered, he knew the fix. He was our in house genius. I saw my grandpa become the smartest person in every room while he worked tirelessly to make our store better. And he continued learning throughout his 70s, showing us that knowledge and becoming “smart” aren’t limited to our formative years. He embodied a growth mindset. The best part about learning is that it’s forgiving. Read Across America at Guerra Elementary this past Friday brought my experience with my grandpa to the forefront of my mind. I have loved reading all my life, but I think in its essence, reading is so crucial to our understanding of the world because you can use it in all and everything you do. You can use it to grow and become better. There’s different types of reading, just like there’s different types of smart. There’s book smart, there’s my grandpa smart, and a whole spectrum of smart in between. Thank you to Mrs. Nava’s 3rd grade class for listening to me read about Beppo (Superman’s super animal monkey) and hearing all about Myth. Meeting these kids made my entire week, I can’t wait to see all the different types of smart and genius they embody as they grow. Here’s to learning for the rest of our lives!

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