real.

i was at a meeting today. and a friend (who, by the way just has this amazing zen quality about her. so energetic but at the same time just so peaceful, so in tune. must be nice!) mentioned that she was teaching a class on banned books. (how cool is that? i wish i could go sit in on that class.) anyway, one of her banned books was blubber by judy blume. (blubber? for real? blubber is banned?) who didn't read blubber or all the other judy blume books growing up? weren't they standard fare for all of us gen xer's? didn't we pass them around? grab them first from the library? talk about them? enjoy them for their honesty and truth and fun?

i was curious. about all these banned books. so i searched around. and found this. check out this list. of the top 100 most frequently challenged books of the decade (1990 -1999)...how many did you read? do you remember? that made an impact on your life? quite a few for me. it just seems pretty unreal to me that some of these classics, the adventures of huckleberry finn, the catcher in the rye, blubber, of mice and men are banned or frequently challenged. for me. finding a judy blume book when i'm thrifting is always a treat. i guess not so for all of us. so i started to think. about the difference between reality and this lala land that some must live in and i remembered this passage from the velveteen rabbit. thank goodness it's not on the list.

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

so. in anticipation of banned books week, september 26 - october 3. go read some judy blume or other banned authors. i know i'm going to.