The Belonging

Every once in a while I find an old scrubby picture book in a free box and save it for collaging.  I never really get to the collaging, but nevertheless, I feel like I have the potential to be a real collage artist one of these days. Cleaning off my home desk this morning, I decided to become the collage artist I was meant to be.  I started with a Little Golden Book called Mister Dog.

I opened to the first page, scissors in hand. The book begins with an illustration of a dog in a bed, slippers neatly placed on his rug. The bed is a person bed, but he has a bone tucked under his pillow.  I read the first lines, "Once upon a time there was a funny dog named Crispin's Crispian.  He was named Crispin's Crispian because-----"

I turned to page two, "----he belonged to himself.   In the mornings, he woke himself up and he went to the icebox and gave himself some bread and milk. He was a funny old dog.  He liked strawberries."

"Why on earth is this dog named Crispin's Crispian?" I wondered.  I also thought it pleasant that Crispin's Crispian belonged to no creature save himself.   I read the rest and came upon additional surprises along the way which I won't spoil for you. Mister Dog is by Margaret Wise Brown, whose books always seem great and a little funky to me.  After reading Mister Dog, her last published book,  I spent an hour on the internets reading about Margaret Wise Brown and her fascinating life.

I blame Margaret Wise Brown and Mister Dog for keeping me from  working on report cards today.
The days of vacation are ticking by and as usual I'm wishing a few extra could be tossed my way. On a day like today, I am adamant that more time is my right, that  I need more time than most people do---time to not-collage and to read about Margaret Wise Brown and to devote myself to blogging about my forays into folderol.  Eventually, I'll snap out of it and get back into schoolish things.  We all get the same amount of time and it's probably enough.  Like Mister Dog, time belongs only to herself.