Isabelle and the bears

Unsurprisingly, my very first venture outside the house took me to the library and to the thriftstore (in that order). From the library, we got another book about Balotje (we already have the one where she borrows her uncle's horse in order to show the poor beastie more of the world).

This one has a fantastic message. It's about the many many bears that Balotje owns: the one she got for her birthday, the one she got when she fell down the stairs, the one that's an old hand-me down from her uncle (the horse-owner), the one she got 'just-like-that-for-no-reason'.

Balotje is finding it increasingly difficult to take care of all these bears; travelling is difficult, and she is often forced to sleep on the floor...


Finally, she has this great idea, she starts giving all the bears away, one by one, to people she knows (often the very people who gave the bears to her in the first place). At the end of the day, Balotje falls asleep in her own bed, completely happy and carefree, with just one bear, a one-eyed wonder that her aunt the stewardess found in a dusty corner of a far-away country.


As coincidences go, I read an essay last week, in Rebecca Walker's volume, about how the care for large numbers of dolls and soft toys trains young girls from an early age to disregard their own needs in favour of those of others (even when stuffed and inanimate). So this morning, Isabelle and I set to work, inspired by Balotje's example...

(continued in the next post)