Because you are hand-drawn, because you were slightly faded, because I paused every time I opened the books, because I would study you and decide which chapter I would read. Because of these things,I loved you.
Because Christopher Robin standing next to the words “My House” was really me and I was really him, laughing and saying, “Silly old bear.” Because “the place where the Woozel wasn’t” was everyplace, but it was especially this place, the small clump of trees Pooh and Piglet circled, their fear growing with every new set of footsteps. Because I was Pooh with a pop gun and brave and I was also Piglet, nervous, wearing a scarf regardless of the weather. I loved you.
Because you were a shortcut to the stories, because I could simply study the map while I retold the stories to myself: Pooh as rain cloud, Tigger stuck at the top of a tree, Eyeore taking the burst balloon in and out of the empty honey pot, finally delighted. Because Pooh would have to learn the lesson of getting stuck, suffer the indignity of Rabbit hanging tea towels on his feet, require the strength of the entire Hundred Acre Woods to free him. I loved you.
Because you were not Dallas, because you were not my house, because you were not my brothers and sisters, because you mapped my imagination so perfectly I almost could not bear at times that you were not a real place that I could go. Because some day I would have tea there, a smackerl of something, because there are no adults there, because being six is old enough.
Silly old bear
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