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even to a four-footed someone who might need something from me.
    Carol finished the ad, made two copies, and handed me one on her way out the door. “I’ll call you tomorrow, and we’ll discuss any possible revisions,” she said.
    After sitting quietly for a few minutes, I finally read it:

    Barely 40 DWF, absolutely childless, seeks special man. Please be intelligent, articulate and fun. Minimal time spent reading on toilet a plus. Must love dogs.

Chapter 5
     
    I have a theory that adult personality can be accurately predicted by the way a three-, four- or five-year- old handles circle time. June and I were sitting with the students on our classroom circle, a long strip of neon pink vinyl tape stuck to the carpet. Green and yellow and orange dots were arranged on top of the circle to designate individual places.
    Back in September, when the children first gathered for circle time, we placed laminated name tags on the floor in front of their dots. Brittany would see her name in block letters, along with the sticker with a picture of a cow she had chosen herself. Finding her place was a complicated process of discovering her cow, “reading” her name, locating the adjacent dot and successfully bringing her body in for a landing on it.
    In a good year, the name tags would be removed some time during October, and even the youngest children would be able to find their places without them. Then we would begin circle games, marching and dancing and choo-choo training around the ring of tape, only to finish the game and sit down on a new dot. There were children who were simply undone by someone else sitting on what had become their dot. Some melted into tears; others pounded the encroachers with clenched fists.
    Today we began circle time with sharing — who had a new puppy, who was wearing new shoes. It was Austin Connor’s turn and, as usual, he had a lot to say. He was almost five, having just missed the kindergarten cutoff, and precociously verbal with parrotlike recall. He had already told us that his parents were “taking a break from their marriage” because his father was “incorrigible.” Some of the kids looked up with vague interest.
    I broke in to tell the children we were now going to learn the Danish Dance of Greeting. It was one of my favorite dances, from an old Kimbo Educational cassette. First we found Denmark on a big blowup vinyl globe and passed it around the circle. The children nodded seriously. Then we found the United States on the globe and measured the distance by holding our arms wide. Far away, we all agreed.
    We stood up, June pressed the play button on the tape deck and we danced:
Clap clap bow, Clap clap bow, Stamp, Stamp, Turn yourself around
. So far, so good. Then way up to tippy-toes and we set off around the circle. We stopped when the music did and took a final bow. “Look down,” I said cheerily, “and sit on a new dot.”
    Several round faces looked at me in horror. Therapy up the road, I predicted. Anal retentiveness, eating disorders, obsessive-compulsive behavior, extreme perfectionism. Maybe a run for political office.
    Austin’s customary dot was the orange one closest to the door. He sat for a minute on a green dot across the way, then sighed. Standing up quickly, he made his way back to his original space, where Molly Greene was now sitting. Very politely, he said, “Excuse me, could you please move your vagina? It’s on top of my dot.”
    Later, when the kids were out of earshot, I asked June, “How old were you when you first said that word?”
    “What word?”
    “The word that Austin said.”
    “Oh, vagina. I don’t know, I guess about the same age. Why?”
    *
    “Vagina,” I said to the steering wheel on my ride home. I made my voice a little bit deeper. “Vagina. Vagina, vagina.” I tried “penis” to see if it was easier. Growing up at my house, the boys all had nicknames for their penises. Michael’s was Duckie. He used to talk to it while he played