Kaethe

I'm not sure what it says about me that I don't really like any poetry written in the last fifty years. But it is no doubt some kind of meaningful that I have always loved Milne.

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Now I read it and think about a soldier coming back from WWI and choosing to immerse himself in domestic life, writing about and for children, and I feel tremendous pity for all those poor bastards, both the ones who made it back and the ones who didn't. I'm totally down with writing poetry and imagining the real lives of stuffed animals, and really looking very closely at a child too young to go to school. Everyone always says to parents "those years fly by so fast" which is true, but not helpful. It doesn't actually clear your life of any of the other things you have to do so that you can really soak in it. It doesn't give you a minute more of sleep in those years when you are chronically deprived. It certainly doesn't buy you an hour out of work to do something pleasant with a child. You go, Milne. I'm sorry that your use of his name and likeness wrecked Christopher Robin's life, but what are you going to do? Everyone's life sucks somehow. At least something good came of it. That's enough.