A really good person. Go ahead. Pat yourself on the back. You know how you were thinking about maybe giving money to the homeless? Or making little survival kits and sending them to Haiti? You don't need to do that anymore. You've done enough. Just, you know, look in a mirror and smile at yourself and say "he's right, you know. You're something else, you."
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Ok, back to your regularly scheduled (ha) blog.
<AHEM>
It started out completely harrowing. Then it was kind of exciting. Then it was really sad.
OK, yeah, that is my experience with playing little league sports as a kid. You got me. But that's not what I'm referring to at this point. Instead, what I'm talking about is The Bear, by Clair Cameron.
The story is told from the viewpoint of 5-year-old Anna. And the harrowing part is when her parents get eaten by a black bear.
I know. You're thinking that black bears just don't up and eat people without there being a lot of bad decisions on the part of the people. Yet in October of 1991 such a thing happened in Algonquin Park, a wilderness 200 miles north of Toronto. In that case there were no kids, but Cameron takes that story and adds two of them. They are Anna and Alex, though Alex is referred to as Sticky (because he's a two year old boy and that is the natural state of the two-year-old boy) and often just Stick. There is also Gwen, Anna's teddy bear.
Spoiler: Anna and Stick escape the bear, but then they live in the wilderness. That's the exciting part. The sad part is all of it, I guess. But especially the end.
You guys, I have a 5-year-old girl. And Clair Cameron just nails it. Forcing herself to tell the story from the random, meandering voice of a tiny child just works so well, and I thought it wouldn't. Man, I really thought it was going to just fail. And yet there I was just sitting next to this little girl and watching her and listening to her thoughts and you guys, I just wanted to hug the crap out of her.
The air is cold. I roll closer to Stick. His breath goes in my ear and it is warm. A little piece of light from the fire is having a dance on the side of the tent but only a little because it is not dark yet. There is no music except Stick's nose air and still the light flicks and rolls on the side of the tent.
She's so brave. And Stick is so cute and so annoying. And thank heavens for Gwen, you guys. Anna really needed Gwen.
Have I admitted to crying in every entry of this blog? I mean at this point it's not endearing or cute. It's just kinda, I don't know, gross?
Anyway, I cried at the end and I was on the train so yippee.
Daddy put his finger to his lips to tell me shh and picked me up with his muscles like I was a baby. Normally I'm not the baby anymore but I was snuggled on his shoulder and no one could see so it was nice to be the baby. Daddy put a blanket around us like Batman's cape, so I'd be warm. He walked out through the zip door. His chin and the whiskers were there and they would grow because he is on our holiday... He laughed a little rumble in his chest that I hear because my ear was smooshed against it and warm. He stood on the edge of the beach and I knew because I could hear the water lick at the stones and I could smell it being warm and deep too.So watch Disney's Bears or whatever. I hear it's really cute.
