General Store

A recent NY Times article described the decline of the child's picture books.   Expense to produce is one side, but more importantly is parents' presumption that pushing kids to read is important for their future (despite evidence of the importance of picture books to childrens' developmental progress.)

I recall vividly spending literally hours staring at some of my childrens' picture books.   My Golden Book of Childrens' poems was wonderfully illustrated.  I recall one picture of Ogen Nash's poem about Belinda and the "cowardly" dragon.  Another from the same  book was the illustration for the Owl and the Pussycat...all sea green and sparkly.

The picture I spent the most time looking at was of a poem about a general store.   The picture was full of so many objects.   I kept going over it identifying and naming and thinking about each item in the picture:  tools, clothes, candy, dishes, all in rich Norman Rockwell style realism and colors.  The picture was so rich with different "things"  that I could occupy myself focusing on one at a time, thinking about its purpose and uses.   But most of all marveling at the richness and splendor of so many things all in one place!   So much to see!   And if I were in the store, so much to touch!

For the time I spent with that picture,  I inhabited that world.  While words could take me on a journey, the journey is not as sensual as that of these pictures.  The picture world became surrounding with color and light.   I hope kids never lose that experience.    And video games don't get it either, because the imagination does not need to work.