All I Ever Learned…

Today I am helping out backstage at my 10 year old daughter’s play. The phone keeps ringing, which is driving me slightly nuts because I have to put off responding to any real estate matters, and I hate doing that, even for a few hours. No choice, however, so I am taking a deep breath and trying to get over myself.

Because, really, it is not my day today- this day belongs firmly to my daughter and the other little ones who have practiced twice a week (and every single day, this week). There are two performances today, and one tomorrow, and the kids are tired. I looked over at the group of “rabbits” in the wings earlier, and one little bunny was curled up on the floor waiting for her cue- nearly asleep.

Grueling. But it’s a great story. The production is a version of the “Velveteen Rabbit,” and if you haven’t read it, you ought to. I won’t give anything away by giving you the Cliff’s Notes version. Little boy gets toy rabbit for birthday, drags toy rabbit around everywhere, loves toy rabbit. Boy gets scarlet fever, pulls through. Nanny is told to remove everything boy has been in contact with and burn it. Before toy rabbit is destroyed, he is turned into a real rabbit by fairy because  boy loved him so. Premise is simple; the actual story is fairly elegant, and seeing a group of elementary students, many still believers in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, act it out is like sprinkling it with fairy dust.

It’s interesting that it is told from the point of view of the velveteen rabbit- that makes the story charming to adults. But what catches the child is the child acknowledges the depth of the love that is attached to a favorite plaything. Most children remember the fierceness of this love. It is absolutely consuming. My daughter Rebecca had a blanket- not even a toy- and she lost it once. She was miserable- she pined, she couldn’t sleep; it reminded me of the pain people newly-in-love feel when they are forced to be apart, except the blanket wouldn’t annoy her two years down the road by leaving his dirty socks rolled up in a ball in the middle of the living room.

But be that as it may, each child gasps- aloud or internally- when that stuffed rabbit gets carted off in the wheelbarrow to be burned. What on the surface to the adults in the audience is a charming story akin to Pinocchio touches something deep in the marrow of the child in the audience.

One thing that this is reminding me is that children, for the most part, are wired to try. These kids are all exhausted, yet when the music starts, their eyes snap open, they stop whining and bickering, and dance and sing for all they are worth. Tickets would be cheap at twice the price.

So I think that’s one thing. But the best thing is this- remember the intensity with which you once loved when you were little, and drag that along into your adult life, even if it hurts so bad you can’t bear it sometimes. Feelings that make you suck in your breath through your teeth- with pleasure or pain- are the cayenne in life.

And don’t we all need a little fire?

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