The Bear

Fuzzy Wuzzy
Was a bear
Fuzzy Wuzzy
Had no hair
Fuzzy Wuzzy
Wasn't very fuzzy – wuz he?

I’ve been packing, packing and packing some more because I’ll be moving in less than three weeks. While I was working in the garage, I looked up and saw my bear. He’s about three feet tall, carved out of a log, and carries a fishing pole with a fish dangling from a string. The above rhyme immediately came to mind. I stopped and stared at him, wondering how many of today’s kids have ever heard the rhyme.

Is it too silly for this day and age? I hope not.

There were a lot of rhymes we recited while jumping rope, too. It struck me that I can’t remember the last time I saw a child skipping rope. Were we too innocent?

Recite the rhyme to a child and see if they laugh or simply roll their eyes at you.

I have some old nursery rhyme books from the 1920s, left over from a relative. There’s a story about a teeny tiny woman who lived in a teeny tiny house, and let me tell you, everything in the story is teeny tiny. I haven’t read it in years, so I don’t remember very much, but (I’m making this up for purposes of this post) the teeny tiny woman went to her teeny tiny kitchen where she reached up to her teeny tiny cupboard to lift out a teeny tiny cup and saucer. When I read it aloud to a child, I start to laugh after about the twentieth reference to something “teeny tiny”. I laugh so hard that tears run down my face. At the end of the story, something upsets the woman and her teeny tiny voice isn’t teeny tiny anymore, but that’s beside the point. The point being, that by the time I reach the end of the story, the child I’m reading it to is laughing uncontrollably, too.

Not every story has to have a lesson in it. Sometimes it’s just about fun. Sometimes there is a lesson, but it’s so subtle that you don’t realize you’ve learned anything for quite a while.

When I read I notice a lot of profanity in some books. As a kid, I didn’t even know what the “f-bomb” meant, much less how to use it in everyday conversation. I recall a friend telling me what it meant, and thinking back, I realize just how innocent she was. I can’t repeat her definition here, but let me tell you, she had no idea what she was talking about. Along those lines, I remember reading a Mickey Mouse book where he said, “Darn!” Uh, I asked my mother if they were allowed to cuss in children’s books. Imagine the conversation if I’d read a book that had the “f-bomb” in it. Talk about innocent! By the way, my mother laughed over that one.

Is there anything wrong with innocence? Not at all. I wish we had more of it these days. Is there anything wrong with writing a clean story? I mean, even a murder mystery can have some good, clean fun in it. That sounds like an oxymoron, doesn’t it? However, it’s true.

Ring around the rosie,

A pocket full of posies,

Ashes, ashes,

All fall down!

With everything that’s going on in the world today, we need something that can take us away from it all, even if for just a moment. Maybe that’s why I tend to lean toward books with humor in them. I realize there are old rhymes supposedly based on ugliness, but as a child neither me nor my friends had any idea that Ring Around the Rosie had to do with the plague. I’m still not sure that’s true, by the way.

So think about Fuzzy Wuzzy or The Teeny Tiny Woman for a few minutes. You might find yourself smiling when you least expect it.

Your thoughts on innocence and/or reality are more than welcome. I honestly don’t live in a dream world, although sometimes it’s tempting.

Now this teeny tiny woman is going to get back to packing her teeny tiny boxes in her teeny tiny house before storing them in her teeny tiny garage.

I lied. My garage is huge and so is the pile of boxes.

Until next week, don't even think about moving unless you've got lots of energy. And, HAPPY THANKSGIVING! 

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Looking for a good book? You might try What Are the Odds – A Sandi Webster Mystery by Marja McGraw.