I loved these as a kid. When I was 2, I got a little green Playskool desk for Christmas. It had a desktop that was also a chalkboard and then when you lifted it up, it was a magnet board on the other side. My parents made sure I had more letters than I knew what to do with. I loved the vivid colors and the sort of squishy-yet-firm feel of the letters. More than Sesame Street, this desk was probably what made me a Word Person. It was my first piece of furniture that was uniquely mine and nobody else fit in it. (This might explain my questionable taste in fashion and furnishings, come to think of it.)

My mother loved that desk because it kept me occupied and out of trouble, but her favorite thing was that it marked a turning point with my grandfather. This man was not remotely enchanted by children, and he had spent two years being appalled that my mother had me while still in college and barely out of childhood herself.

So it was gratifying to her when he came to see us at Christmas and I was in raptures over this desk. He leaned over and stuck a letter on the board.

“What’s that?”

“The big letter M.”

“Huh. OK, what’s THAT?”

“The small letter y.”

This went on for several more letters and numbers before he muttered that I was “a goddamn prodigy,” and stumped off to get a glass of iced tea. When I was older, I remember my mother and grandmother used to tell that story and laugh at him, and he would shrug and ask me what book I was reading this week.

I never got the prodigy compliment again, and I certainly didn’t live up to the hype. But by the time I was 11 or so, he and I were able to have some fairly entertaining conversations, and I got to keep having them until after my son was born. That’s a pretty good run for a rocket scientist and a copy editor.