I loved reading fairy tales as a boy, checking out armfuls of Jack and the Beanstalk, Aesop Fables, The Paper Bag Princess, Where The Wild Things Are; and so on. Even in my current age of 37 years, I still find wonder and enchantment within these pages. They are more than silly tales to regal your children in bed with, they are cautionary, they inadvertently inspire the practice of virtue and good will when good sense may never hope to prevail.
They are the stories that have made humanity what it is, a testament to the power of his courage and the beauty of her imagination. Should there not have been a hare who was once beaten in a race by a tortoise; then perhaps there wouldn't be children who lack in ability, temperament, desire or ambition to pull themselves up to confident measure by teaching them ways to embrace their hindrances and to transform them into strength.
The stories that we tell ourselves, and our children make us who we are. Who we want to be. Who we want them to be. The stories are patient, only revealing as much as the eyes or ears desire. They brush themselves on our canvas, as we often do ourselves each and every day, painting a picture of how we relate to the world.
So, yes. I am not ashamed to admit that while my love has once waned with age for that which has made me; I am proud to admit now, that what has made me is also something worth laying my life down for.
For there is little more of merit in all of God's green earth, than the unfolding, eternal story of man.
Of who he is.
And who he wants to be.
