To Become Real

Christmas Morning

A retired teacher is blessed to think back over the years and remember the highs and lows of teaching. She/he is fortunate to pull up memories of random students and hope she provided them with what they will need for the next years.

I loved it so.

Perhaps some of the many incredible memories are also books, precious ones that shone above all the Sponge Bob, My Little Pony Adventures, and other  books.  Sharing those great books was a shining light I hope they could see.

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams, illustrated by Michael Nicholas, and published in 1922. It is a Pinocchio book in many ways, but incredible in its writing. When we read it in class, I wept for its beauty.

Here is an excerpt which shows exquisite writing. (I hope you give it a chance and see if you can experience its artistry.):

The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others.  He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seam underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. 
He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else.  For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those play things that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understood all about it.

Someday, I hope and wish and desire to be a writer who can see beyond the mundane, and produce writing that makes the reader say, "Oh. So beautiful. Oh. I can see it. I can see it."

The entire book can be found at Or: How Toys Become Real 

Longing for Life