The Gift of the Magi

Among other things, I am tutoring an adult literacy learner. He enjoys reading and seems interested in vocabulary, word meanings and derivations ... The workbook we are using had an "adaptation" of an O. Henry story ... and I let myself get carried away. We are now reading "The Gift of the Magi," in its original, un-adapted glory.

Since he's devout, I thought he would like the reference. But he didn't quite recall who the magi were, or what the kings did. When I told him, and explained about metaphors, he got it right away; and yet when we began to read, stumbling on the old-fashioned, ten-dollar words and periphrases, he lost the trail of meaning. And I thought, what have I done? Am I making him feel bad because he doesn't understand?

And then, not two pages in, as soon as we read about Della's hair and Jim's watch and their poverty on Christmas eve, he said: She's going to sell her hair. And he's going to sell his watch.

And when the watch chain was described as chaste and lacking meretricious ornamentation, and I said that "meretricious" came from the Latin word for prostitute and that meant the chain was beautifully simple and not all tricked out like a hooker, he laughed.

Metaphor of the day: "Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi."