When I grow up, I want to be...
There are a very few books I remember from my pre-reading days, books I'm sure my parents read to me repeatedly. The Bunny Book (written by Patricia Scarry, illustrated by Richard Scarry) was my favorite. It's a simple story with a surprise ending. There's some kind of bunny family reunion going on. It begins with a baby bunny being tossed in the air by his father, who speculates with his mother about what the baby bunny will be when he grows up. So do the baby's siblings, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and maybe a few other friends and relations. They come up with the answers one would expect: a farmer bunny, a police bunny, a firefighter bunny. I can't remember all of those guesses because, in the end, they're wrong. The baby bunny knows exactly what he will be when he grows up: a daddy bunny. And that, I knew from my first memory of that book, is what I wanted to be. No, not a bunny; a daddy. I would love and nurture my children, playing with them, takin...