The inscription reads:Jack,
Merry first Christmas from your first doctor.
Dr. Mike
The book: The Cat in the Hat. The reason: the young Dr. Mike had just spent 26 hours with his face between my legs awaiting the arrival of what he called, " the biggest baby he ever delivered!!"
The biggest baby he ever delivered entered the world 5 days early – read between the lines here, no time for bikini wax – and straight into the arms of the most ill-prepared mother since the so-called virgin.
What I did manage to do before I spat out the little bastard was: put up a small Christmas tree, and waddle into Baby Gap to purchase a striped cotton hat and matching onesie – hence "the hat". The hat was placed on the little bastard just after they wiped the goo off of his enormously pointed head.
The Cat in the Hat. Get it. Stay with me. Thus beginning our library of the dumbest fucking literature since the Old Testament – children's books.
There were very few children's books I could get through without slamming them shut and making up a story of my own. Take for instance, Love You for Fucking Ever, by Robert Munsch. Does a child really need to fall asleep with visions of himself cradling a gin and piss-soaked old woman in a see-through nightie?
Together, we read Richard Scarry's acid-induced Busytown classic, Cars and Trucks and Things that Go, over and over and over. My attempts to skip pages were outsmarted by little bastard's chubby hand slapping down and flipping back the page to where the pig family are driving the pickle car. Had I given birth to a complete moron?
And then there's Dr. Seuss. I hated Dr. Seuss more than Sesame Street and Barney combined. The incessant rhyming, the creepy characters that would show up when Sally and her brother were home alone because mommy was turning tricks on Mulberry Street.
Woozles (Canada's Oldest Children's Bookstore) on Birmingham Street have all the boring kiddie classics, plus the occasional ripper, like Walter the Farting Dog. They also have a medicated, er, dedicated and helpful staff who – suppressing the childhood incident involving Uncle Boozie and his Goodnight Moons tuck-in – pretend to like the stuff.
Dr. Seuss, a.k.a. Theodor Geisel would have been 106 today. Geisel's mother, a bakery worker, was 6 feet tall, 200 pounds and of German descent. Geisel probably peed the bed listening to her foreshadowing tales of bread ovens and gingerbread men. But, Happy Birthday anyway.
Oddly enough, The Cat in the Hat was written because Dr. Seuss thought the much-loved, Dick and Jane Have ADHD primers were insanely boring. My theory is, his books were the ultimate revenge. Yes they were. Yes they were. According to Geisel's widow, Dr. Seuss didn't even like kids, claiming, "He was slightly afraid of the little bastards."
Okay, so I embellished her quote a bit, but it makes for a better story.
If you do not like it.
Not one little bit.
I don't care a little.
In fact, I don't give a shit.
halifaxbroad@gmail.com
www.woozles.com
