Hey Diddle Diddle

Some of the best gifts that my kids got this Christmas were books. Anyone who knows me is aware of my love of books, and one of my most fervent wishes for my children is that I somehow manage to pass along my love of reading to them.

Before I comment on this one particular book that we got, I have to say that I love the book and we have read it for the past three nights. That said........it's a book of nursery rhymes. They all bring me back to my childhood........my Mom loved to read to me, and often turned to the Mother Goose-ish classics. They are all lodged somewhere in a foggy little portion of my brain, and this book is causing me to dust off some memories of baked blackbirds and Mother Hubbard's that I had long since forgotten.

Has anyone else read any of the classic nursery rhymes lately? Like, as an adult?

"And the dish ran away with the spoon"

* What a little trollop! This entire nursery rhyme is wonderfully nonsensical,and it ends with a tabletop elopement! I love Hey Diddle Diddle!

"The King of Hearts Called for the tarts and BEAT the Knave FULL SORE"

*The Knave ends this one by vowing to steal no more ~ who wouldn't after being beaten full sore?! ? I don't even know for sure what full sore means, but I am guessing that it's modern day equivalent is a "beat down". A full beat down by some rich fat King on some poor little servant boy over some tarts! "The Queen of Hearts" is full of crime and violence, and only about 10 short sentences long. (The funny thing about this one is that Luke pointed to the Queen and said "Mama", then pointed to the King and said "Danta!, which means Santa. Me and Danta getting down and dirty on some Knave over some tarts! Imagine it!".)

"Down will come baby, cradle and all"

*Um, the baby falls out of a tree. Falls! The bough breaks! Down goes baby! And this (Rock-a-Bye Baby) is likely our cultures most well known nursery rhyme. How utterly bizarre. Stupid wind.

"And so the poor Dog had none"

*None, in this case, referring to food. Poor Old Mother Hubbard and her bare cupboards! Her poor dog! Where the heck are Old Mother Hubbard's children? Why isn't she being taken care of? Whats to become of the Dog?

"Stuck a feather in his hat and called it macaroni"

*What is up with the Yankee Doodle anyway? Surely the feather did not resemble macaroni, did it? Was the Doodle a man of great creativity? An artist perhaps? Is macaroni the only word that rhymes with pony?

"Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after"

*Jack got a busted head just trying to get some water! Quite the antithesis of the "Little engine that could". And I'm most curious about why Jill went tumbling after.....was it a Princess Bride sort of throw oneself down the hill after hapless man thing? Why didn't Jill continue on without her clumsy Jack and fetch the water herself? Perhaps the hill was really a precarious cliff? Why would a well be perched atop such a dangerous hill? Totally confused.

"Humpty Dumpty"

*Enough said. He jumped. He died. Yet in the books he is always pictured sitting all round and jolly atop the wall ~ PRE fall. Poor Humpty. What a mess he must have made.

"Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie"

* What a large pie it must have been ! And those darling, freedom loving birds! I know that they came out singing and all, but still, it's funny that "Sing a song of Sixpence" is a vague introduction to our children to the idea that many of those cute and cuddly little animals that we talk about in our picture books ultimately end up on our table. I can only imagine how tough and terrible a blackbird would taste. And why would they have baked them with the feathers? Who want's to eat feather?

"She had so many children she didn't know what to do, she gave them some broth without any bread, then whipped them all soundly and put them to bed"

*Someone call CPS! And where the heck is the old man for Pete's sake? Surely there must be an old man in the picture if she keeps churning out children? What a horrible story. The poor abused family who lives in a lousy old shoe! Can you even imagine the stench of an entire so-many-children-ed family living in a stinking SHOE without any bread? And the cacophony of the whippings of so many children? What a terrible place to live.

"There I met an old man who would not say his prayers, I took him by the left leg and threw him down the stairs"

*How utterly terrible! An Elder Abuser! Pray for yourself you horrid stair throwing person in Goosey Goosey Gander!

Anyway. I love the book. I love reading the stories, the pictures are fantastic and 3-d and much loved by Luke. The rhymes, the rhythm, the cadence, the whole bit. I was just a bit taken aback as I read some of these things as an adult.

In today's PC world of feel good about yourself, everyone is a winner, no one is ever wrong, everyone loves you, you are perfect sort of children's books..........I have to admit that some old school nursery rhyme ass kicking was a bit refreshing to me.