StoryTime Creep-Out

Does anyone else think.. um... stalker-mom when they read The Runaway Bunny by Margaret (Un)Wise Brown to their children?

Jonathan asked me to read stories at about 11:30pm last night. It was late. I should've been headed for bed. I nestled into his bedcovers to wait as he chose some books from the shelf.

One of the stories he chose was The Runaway Bunny. Now, I'm not normally one to publicly eviscerate something most people love, but the story made me twitch uncomfortably the longer it went on. The back cover reads, "Within a framework of mutual love a bunny tells his mother how he will run away and she answers his challenge by indicating how she will catch him. Warmth prevails."

Yeah, warmth prevailed alright. The kind that creeps up my neck and into my hairline and makes my eyes dart quickly back and forth, checking around dark corners.

I mean, it's one thing to say "but I'll miss you terribly if you run away!" followed up with a series of discussions about what is so bloody wrong he feels running away is his best option and, perhaps, like, just for kicks, what she can do about it. THAT might actually be touching.

The kid wants to run away. So something is drastically wrong, right? I mean, happy kids don't want to run away. Kids who like their parents don't want to run away. But this kid - er, kit - is quite adamant about running away. So adamant that despite his mother's increasingly creepy explanations of how she'll morph into different creatures in order to catch him, he continues to up the ante. Out of desperation, I suspect.

"Oh yeah? Oh yeah? Well, I'll... I'll... I'll turn into a bird and FLY away from you! Now get away from me, you psychotic, creepy, overly-controlling, poor excuse for a loving, caring mother!"

Otherwise, it's a lovely little story.

There. I feel much better now.