This Halloween for me has been all about revisiting my childhood, often indirectly. My weekend movie marathons have consisted primarily of flicks I enjoyed as a child, while my weekday movie watching has most prominently featured films that I'd see in a video store or bits of on TV, but never actually got around to watching. This has extended to all sorts of areas, as I look through my old(or sometimes not-so-old) boxes of toys and memorabilia, and I've been reading Bunnicula to my daughter before bedtime. This put me in mind of a book I was mildly creeped out by as a child Dr. Seuss' Oh, The Thinks You Can Think. The book isn't scary, or even designed to be scary, but towards the end of the typically slim book is this two-page image:
That image would always get me slightly spooked, and it's stayed in my mind throughout my life. Amber has been teasing me about this for being a coward, but I think she's maybe misunderstanding me. I was never afraid of the picture, it never gave me nightmares or kept me up at night, but it haunted me from the first moment I saw it. The familiar distorted architecture and stylized figures combined with the silhouette-only Jibboo, did instill a little bit of fear. But it was like the fear you feel when studying a spider you've just caught; fascination mixed with some primal nervousness. And that caption, it stuck with me, too. Many a time have I asked myself, 'what
would I do if I met a Jibboo? What. Would. I. Do?'
1 comment:
This moment has always held a fascination for me too. I have found that it comes to mind at times when I am forced to think about destiny or strange crossroads that intersect our ordinary lives, some of which we see and many more of which are passed by unnoticed.
The picture is obviously eerie. And I think the slight menace intoned by the words "Or what would you do..." adds to an overall sense of curiosity and dread that fixes the scene in memory.
When I think about this page by Dr. Seuss I also think of the story of Appointment in Samarra, a very old legend that involves an encounter with Thanatos, or Death.
"Oh the Places You'll Go" is one of my favorite Dr. Seuss books, but not the one most loved by me (back then and to this day). That distinction belongs to "I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew" -- a book written for all the wanderfreunde.
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