Ramona's World by Beverly Cleary

[Schultz <dschultz@SUFFOLK.LIB.NY.US>]

Dear ALL,

A friend sent this to me - Thought you all might be interested.

Doreen Shultz
Library
Mary G. Clarkson School
Bay Shore, NY
dschultz@suffolk.lib.ny.us


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 14 Aug 1999 14:47:08 EDT
From: SheriDebra@aol.com
To: akielbas@suffolk.lib.ny.us, mxms56@yahoo.com, dschultz@suffolk.lib.ny.us
Subject: (no subject)

RAMONA'S WORLD
By Beverly Cleary
Alan Tiegreen, illustrator
(Morrow Junior)
ISBN: 0688168167
Ages 9-12

Excerpt

Chapter 1

Ramona Quimby was nine years old. She had brown hair, brown eyes, and no
cavities. She had a mother, a father, a big sister named Beatrice who was
called Beezus by the family, and --- this was the exciting part --- a baby
sister named Roberta after her father, Robert Quimby.

"Look at her tiny fingernails," Ramona marveled as she looked at the sleeping
Roberta, "and her little eyebrows. She is already a whole person, only
little." Ramona couldn't wait for the first day of school so she could spread
the news about her baby sister.

That day finally came. It was a warm September day, and Ramona, neat and
clean, with lunch bag in hand, half skipped, half hopped, scrunching through
dry leaves on the sidewalk. She was early, she knew, but Ramona was the sort
of girl who was always early because something might happen that she didn't
want to miss. The fourth grade was going to be the best year of her life, so
far.

Ramona was first to arrive at the bus stop in front of Mrs. Pitt's house.
Mrs. Pitt came out the front door and began sweeping her front steps.

"Hi, Mrs. Pitt," Ramona called out. "Guess what! My baby sister is two months
old."

"Good for her," said Mrs. Pitt, agreeable to a baby in the neighborhood.
Babies did not scatter candy wrappers or old spelling papers on the lawn in
front of her house.

Ramona pretended she was playing hopscotch until her friend Howie, who was
already familiar with Roberta, joined her along with other children some with
their mothers, who were excited about the first day of school. "Hi, Ramona,"
he said, and leaned against a tree in the strip of grass between the sidewalk
and the street. He opened his lunch bag and began to eat his sandwich. Ramona
knew he was doing this so he wouldn't be bothered carrying his lunch.

"Little boy!" Mrs. Pitt called out. "Little boy, don't you drop any papers or
orange peels in front of my house. And stay off my grass!"

"Okay." Howie took another bite of his sandwich as he moved to the sidewalk.
Howie was not easily excited, which Ramona sometimes found annoying. She was
often excited. She liked to be excited.

When the yellow bus stopped, Ramona was first on board. She plunked herself
down on a seat across the aisle from another fourth grader, a boy named Danny
who was wearing a white T-shirt with Trail Blazers printed on it. Ramona
called him Yard Ape because she thought he acted like an ape on the
playground. She was glad he had not moved away during the summer. "I have a
new baby sister," she informed him.

Yard Ape closed his eyes and hit his forehead with the palm of his hand.
"Another Ramona," he said, and groaned.

Ramona refused to smile. "You have a little brother," she reminded him.

"I know," answered Yard Ape, "but we just keep him for a pet."

Ramona made a face at him so he wouldn't know she liked him. When Ramona
jumped off the bus at Cedarhurst School, she greeted old friends, most of
them in new or at least clean, clothes for starting the fourth grade. When
she saw Janet, whom she had often seen in the park during the summer, the two
girls compared calluses on the palms of their hands. "Your calluses are
really big," said Janet, impressed.

It was true. Ramona's calluses were hard and yellow because she lived close
to the park, where she often went with Beezus and her mother and Roberta on
warm summer days. She worked hard at the rings --- pump, pump, swing, pump,
pump, swing --- and by the end of summer she was able to travel down the line
of rings and back again.

"There's Susan," cried Janet, and ran to join her. Reluctantly Ramona
followed. "Hi, Susan," she said, eyeing Susan's short blond curls.

"Hi, Ramona," answered Susan. Neither girl smiled. The trouble was the
grown-up Quimbys and Susan's parents, the Kushners, were friends. Ramona did
not know what Mrs. Kushner said, but her own parents often said things like,
"Now, you be nice to Susan," "Susan is such a well-behaved little girl," or
"Susan's mother says Susan always sets the table without being asked." Such
remarks did not endear Susan to Ramona. There was more. In kindergarten Susan
did not like Ramona, who could not resist pulling the long curls she had at
that time and saying, "Boing!" as she released them. In first grade, when the
class was making owls out of paper bags, Susan copied Ramona's owl. The
teacher held up Susan's owl to show the class what a splendid owl Susan had
made. This seemed so unfair to Ramona that she crunched Susan's owl and found
herself in trouble, big trouble. So how could anyone expect the two girls to
be friends? As Ramona expected, the calluses on Susan's hands were so small
they could scarcely be seen.

Then Ramona saw a new girl who was standing alone. A new fourth grader,
Ramona decided, and because she admired the girl's long fair hair she went
over to her and asked, "What's your name?"

"Daisy", answered the girl. "Daisy Kidd." When she smiled, Ramona saw that
she was wearing bands on her teeth. "What's your name?" Daisy asked. As
Ramona told her, the bell rang, ending their conversation.

On her way to the fourth grade Ramona passed her former classroom, where the
teacher was standing outside the door welcoming her new class. When she saw
Ramona she waved and said, "How's bright-eyed, bushy-tailed Ramona?"

People often called Ramona bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. When she was younger
she blinked her eyes, held up her hands like paws, and wiggled her bottom as
if she were wagging a tail. Now that she was a fourth grader she was too
grown-up for such babyishness, so she waved and said, "Hi, Mrs. Whaley."

Ramona's fourth-grade teacher was Mrs. Meacham, a plump, cheerful woman in a
green pantsuit and blouse printed with flowers, a good sign. Ramona liked
teachers who wore bright cheerful clothes. Mrs. Meacham, Ramona decided, must
be very old, because Howie's father had gone to school with her when he was a
boy.

After inspecting her new teacher, Ramona looked at the chalkboard for
spelling words. The board was blank, another good sign. Mrs. Meacham passed
out name tags and made a little speech about how learning was fun in the
fourth grade and everyone should work together to make this a great year. She
then passed out papers with borders of dinosaurs, another hopeful sign,
Ramona thought, even though dinosaurs were more for third graders than fourth
graders. Mrs. Meacham said, "So I will get to know you better, I want each of
you to write a paragraph telling me about yourself."

Ramona tapped her pencil on her nose and noticed that Yard Ape, who sat
across the aisle, was already writing, apparently without having to think.
Susan, in front of Ramona, leaned her head on her fist. A boy went to the
pencil sharpener. Someone sighed. Feet shuffled. Ramona began to write. She
enjoyed writing in cursive because her third-grade teacher once said,
"Ramona, your cursive is better than mine." Now she wrote fast because she
had so much to say: "My name is Ramona Quimby. I have a baby sister. She is
cute. She screems if she is hunrgy." Ramona paused. Screems looked peculiar.
Maybe it was spelled with ea instead of ee. Oh, well. Anyone would know what
she meant. She had so much to say she did not want to waste time spelling.
"Sometimes I sit on the coach and hold her."

Ramona enjoyed writing. Her face grew flushed as she wrote faster and faster
toward the dinosaurs at the bottom of the page. Her last lines, not as neat
as her first, were written across the dinosaur heads. "She can grab my
figner. Mother says I used to look like her. She says I can be her roll
modle." Ramona squeezed a tiny sketch of a baby's sleeping face between a
brontosaurus and a tyrannosaurus.

Ramona was proud of her work. She glanced around to see what her classmates
had written about themselves. She leaned forward to look over Susan's
shoulder. Susan had written half a page in neat cursive and was busy coloring
dinosaurs, neatly of course, with crayons. Ramona read, "My name is Susan. My
favorite color is blue. My favorite food is..." Ramona did not need to read
any further. She half rose from her seat to look across the aisle toward Yard
Ape and read in his neat uphill cursive, "My name is Daniel. Call me Yard
Ape. I am nine years old. I am not married. I am a kid and proud of it."

Me too, thought Ramona, filled with admiration for Yard Ape, a smart boy who
always earned stars or Good Work! at the top of his papers and looked as if
he was about to get into trouble. Somehow he never did, not in the classroom.
On the playground he ran faster, yelled louder, and kicked balls farther than
any of the other boys.

"All right, class," said Mrs. Meacham, "pass your papers to the front."
Ramona was so pleased with her work she was almost sorry to part with it.

At lunchtime when the class went to the multipurpose room, Daisy sat down
beside Ramona. "Okay if I sit here?" she asked.

"Sure," said Ramona. Together the girls tore open their lunch bags. They
shared Ramona's corn chips and each ate half of Daisy's brownie. Ramona told
Daisy about Roberta; Daisy wished she had a little sister She only had a big
brother. Ramona admired Daisy's long blond hair; Daisy admired Ramona's short
hair and said she was lucky to have hair that didn't get tangled when it was
washed. It was a good beginning.

After lunch Mrs. Meacham said, 'I've had time to look over what you have
written. There is one description I would like to read to you."

Mine! Mine! Ramona silently prayed, and sure enough, it was Ramona's
description of Roberta that her teacher chose to read. Mrs. Meacham did not
seem to notice a few misspelled words, because she knew what Ramona meant.
The class seemed to enjoy it, and Ramona was ecstatic. She couldn't wait to
tell her mother.

The rest of the day passed quickly. Ramona ran all the way home from the bus
and found her mother sitting on the couch drinking tea and reading a book for
her book club, which met once a month. "Guess what!" Ramona burst out. "I
wrote a composition about Roberta."

"Sh-h-h. Roberta's asleep." Mrs. Quimby placed a marker in her book and
closed it. "Sounds interesting," she said, and took a sip of tea.

"It was," whispered Ramona. "It was so interesting that Mrs. Meacham read it
to the whole class. Mrs. Meacham is about a million years old, but she's
nice."

"I can't wait to read your composition," said her mother. Ramona frowned
thoughtfully. "I suppose I could have said Roberta spits up sometimes."

"We don't have to tell the whole world our little secrets." Mrs. Quimby
looked amused, which Ramona found pleasant, not like being laughed at. Mrs.
Quimby sipped her tea.

It was a moment for confidences. Ramona told her mother, "There's a new girl
named Daisy Kidd with bands on her teeth and long golden hair like a fairy
princess and a brownie in her lunch. I know I am going to like her a lot."

"Good. She sounds nice," said Mrs. Quimby.

Ramona picked up her mother's book. Moby Dick. "What's this about?" she asked.

"A whale that bit off a man's leg," said Mrs. Quimby. "Our book club decided
to read a book we had all heard about all our lives but had never actually
read."

"Sounds exciting." Ramona opened the book, which turned out not to look
exciting at all. The print was small, the lines were close together, and
there were almost no quotation marks. She closed the book. She liked her own
writing better. That wasn't all she liked. She liked Mrs. Meacham, she liked
Daisy, she liked Yard Ape, she liked the fourth grade. It was going to be a
great year.


Copyright (c) 1999 by Beverly Cleary. Reprinted with permission from
publisher. All rights reserved.

.


7/29/99 10:26 PM

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==-=
All postings to LM_NET are protected under copyright law.
 To quit LM_NET (or set-reset NOMAIL or DIGEST), send email to:
   listserv@listserv.syr.edu          In the message write EITHER:
    1) SIGNOFF LM_NET 2) SET LM_NET NOMAIL or 3) SET LM_NET DIGEST
 4) SET LM_NET MAIL  * Please allow for confirmation from Listserv
 For LM_NET Help & Archives see:  http://ericir.syr.edu/lm_net/
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=-=-=