Karen Wils photo
ESCANABA — Children’s books are more than just paper and glue.
Kid’s books are magic. They make a memory that lasts a life time.
“Good Night Moon,” “The Cat in the Hat,” Corduroy Bear, and “The Velveteen Rabbit” are unforgettable books.
My own children had favorites. “Thomas the Tank Engine” and “The Rusty Trusty Tractor” were a couple of Bob’s choice reads that we read over and over so many times that I’m sure I still have them memorized.
Richard Scarry’s Busytown with Huckle Cat and Lowly Worm and Maurice Sendak’s Little Bear and Cat are characters that my daughter Ellen loved.
Simple little books have a big impact on young minds.
Recently my sister was tidying up things in the basement of our family home. She found and presented me with a very faded blue carpenter’s apron.
It was an old relic from my dad.
“Should I get rid of this,” she asked?
“No,” I said, “That’s Katy No Pocket’s bib”.
My sister scratched her head in wonder until I explained.
Many, many years ago when I was in kindergarten at Webster Grade School, my teacher Mrs. Goymerac read to my class the book “Katy No Pocket.”
In this classic children’s story written in 1944, Katy the kangaroo struggles to care for and hold her baby because she has no pocket. Of coarse she asks other animals to help her out but not until she meets a kind carpenter does she get help.
The carpenter (who is smoking a pipe and wears a plaid shirt like my dad) gives the sad kangaroo his bib with many pockets so that she can have a place to carry her (joey) baby kangaroo.
How I listened to that story sitting on my little resting mat on the floor.
I remember going home after school and going into my dad’s workshop and stuffing a toy animal into one of the pockets on his big carpenter’s apron. Later when Dad discovered the toy in his apron, I retold him the story of Katy No Pockets.
For a year, no more, it was common for Dad to find my teddy bear, toy bunny, or little cat in the pocket of his apron. He just laughed it off and said “I guess I’m Katy No Pockets today.”
That simple story about a mother kangaroo with no pocket fascinated me and made me think. Over the years I enjoyed watching and reading about wild animals of all sorts. I’ve learned a lot about mammals, marsupials and birds. And I learned that a mother kangaroo must have a pouch before she can have a joey.
Now I know the difference between fiction and non-fiction books but children’s books encouraged me to learn about and love animals.
The moral of this story is to read to your children. Surround them with books of all sorts. Visit libraries. Reading will help a person with almost everything in life.
If you have no children to read to, read to the cat or dog. My daughter read to her Topaz, for nearly twenty years. Cats are good listeners but sometimes they decide to take cat naps.
As winter closes in on us and the nights grow cool and long, a good book, cup of cocoa and a cozy quilt makes all the difference in the world.
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Karen (Rose) Wils is a lifelong north Escanaba resident. Her folksy columns appear weekly in Lifestyles.
This post was originally published on here
