Until Tomorrow: Letters to my sons; Episode 2: 3/2/21
This is a series of letters to my sons about the world they go into, things I forgot to mention or things that I mentioned so often they bear repeating. Published every Tuesday. Follow here! Or maybe even here.
Hi honey,
Dad and I were talking in the car on the way to Winthrop about racism. The brothers were there, too, and it ended up being one of our more legendary road trips. I love that even the littlest has things to add. I just had to share with you what I’m stuck on right now. It has to do with Dr. Seuss. Ironically or not today would have been his 117th birthday. That is crazy to me that anything he wrote stands the test of time, but now there is a lot of push back in the media about his use of racist images.
Growing up in San Diego and reading his books it was always very clear to me that he was a San Diegan at heart. Come on, those trees, you don’t see those anywhere else. And he was one of Granny’s contemporaries. She was born in 1898 and he was born in 1904. She came to San Diego in the early 1900s and it sounds like he came around 1928 for the first time. He lived in other places but finally made his home there in about 1948, Grama would have been 2.
I recognize that some of his books cross a line and I remember reading them as a kid and not liking them, but I also know that as an educator it is also my job to help us see what needs to change and use examples as best we can. I read this week that he was a part of a blackface minstrel as well and that got us talking quite a bit about how that the use of blackface was never a positive but it was mainstream. I think about my grandma’s family and their history in Vaudeville and I wonder if we were able to trace our roots would we, too, find performers that wore blackface? I imagine any Vaudeville show today would be too much, too over the line, too crass, too racist, too sexist, and yet it was a different era and it was very popular. I have often thought about how we judge people and whether it is by today’s standards or the time in which they were alive.
I also know a little bit about the dear doctor and I’m not willing to throw the baby out with the bath water. And yet I want to make sure that I’m thinking about Seuss with all his warts. I’m attaching an article from the art gallery in La Jolla which talks about the Sneetches and Horton and those were my pieces of evidence as well. If you grow up in a racist society where it is all around you and you perform, write, draw, act, sing, aren’t you at the mercy of the masses to make your way in the world. And then if you learn that you have harmed anyone that you make amends, you change your ways. I believe he did just that with Mulberry Street (changing it eventually) and the Sneetches, not to mention my favorite, the Lorax. It makes me wonder how much is enough. If he was woke about inclusion and the environment but had been racist in his past, does that mean we should assign him to the chronicles of cancel culture? It is indeed tricky.
Here’s my thinking on it at this moment though — we don’t get to choose the era we are born and the mainstream that belongs to us, for f sake, that last president made things okay that I never would have thought would get there, but at some point, if we continue to use the work of said person from history then we are obligated to continue the evolution. So while the dear doctor died when I was in college, I believe he would have continued to change and grow — he was a prolific writer and as such it is quite possible that some of his work would be controversial.
I actually love that his birthday falls just two days after Black History Month, because, don’t get me started on why that has to be the shortest month of the year, but I love it because we can continue the dialog. Who doesn’t love the cat and the things 1 and 2, but let’s use the books for a conversation rather than a plain old read aloud. Let’s read the books to the kids and have them ask questions, let’s tell them the year that they were written and let’s see what they think needs to change. Let’s also not read just his books and include authors of color and women in our repertoire. (You know which author I would say is number one!) Wouldn’t it be better to teach a lesson about how even as a Kindergartener or 1st grader that you have the power to see literature as something that can sometimes get it wrong and realize that it is okay to edit and change and evolve. Isn’t that empowering. Wouldn’t it be amazing if we could have Ta-Nehisi Coates read Red Fish Blue Fish and give us a commentary on how it could be better? Or Amanda Gorman review what could be racist or elitist about Oh the Places You’ll Go? We can’t get Dr. Seuss back and ask him directly, unfortunately. But his works are inspiring so let’s do what we can to use his words to inspire every student to become an author — they could start by fixing If I Ran the Zoo or even using it as a frame to start their own writing. Anyway, miss you and wish you were here for these talks, I know you would have something great to add.
Until tomorrow,
Mom
Hi darling,
So you have to hear about this thing going on in the #JHBC! I know you miss hearing about Jen and her escapades. Anyway, she posted the other day about Night Jen and Morning Jen — the concept is — Night Jen can be good to Morning Jen by washing her face, making the coffee, running the dishwasher. Morning Jen can be good to Night Jen by making the bed and opening the curtains. You know, just taking care of stuff and not leaving it for the next person and in this case for herself. The best is that on the JHBC people keep posting the things they do for their Night or Day version. I was telling Dad about it giving an example like, “Night Denise can help Morning Denise by drinking a glass of water.” Cooper looked pained, I know he’s thinking, holy crap there are more than one of her? He can’t wait to be with you at school!
We miss you.
Until tomorrow,
Mom
Hi kid,
We were at a brewery this week and holy moly. Restaurants are at 25% capacity due to COVID and we were at the limit — a nice retired couple that had been to Arizona and gotten COVID there, a young local who was pregnant and knew the older couple waiting for her to go order, two other couples further away, us and two other guys. Both were about the same age as Dad and I and we had seen at least one of them down by the river when we were riding our Fat Tire Bikes. They were fine enough, but then their wives arrived. Holy. It is 37 degrees outside, we are all tired from being in the snow and on the bikes, everyone is just getting a beer and a burger and then we are out, just wanting to support the local economy, but holy. I know it exists and I always point it out but the entitlement that walked in with these two Karens was more than I had seen in awhile, but that’s probably because we are always at home. Anyway, it wasn’t that bad they just wanted to turn off the fire pits and heaters because they were too warm and just move the table so they could sit and see each other the way they wanted. I just couldn’t anymore, but just wanted to say — please, date, marry, whatever, but do not fall for someone that believes their needs are more important than anyone else in the room.
Until tomorrow,
Mom
#writeeveryday #writelikeyouarerunningoutoftime #untiltomorrow #connectionconversations #liveacreativelife #mynextbook #writerswrite
