Bedtime Stories

Alexis and I decided to go to Barnes and Noble for FHE on Monday night and read some of our favorite children's stories.  After looking around a bit, I happened upon an old favorite of mine: The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein.  It is a provocative story with an interesting ending.


I highly recommend it for any family because it is an easy read, has fun illustrations and is both simple enough for a child to enjoy and still complex enough for an adult to appreciate.  It is the story of a boy who plays with a Tree that gives him all that it can to make him happy, which in turn makes the Tree happy.  The story follows the life of the Tree as the boy grows older and comes around less and less often, except to ask some favor of the Tree--giving it nothing in return.  Eventually, the Tree is left as nothing but a sad little stump, lonely and unappreciated until the boy comes along in his old age to keep it company--making the Tree "very happy."

What the story could mean, according to someone on Wikipedia, is that the Tree's selfless and unrewarded giving throughout the life of the boy represents the selfless and often unappreciated service rendered by parents to their children who, until they are grown and in the same position as their parents once were, may not appreciate that service.  It is an interesting way to look at the story and I like it much better than seeing the little boy as selfish or uncaring.

Alexis chose Dr. Seuss's classic "The Lorax" with its Truffula Trees. 

I hadn't read this particular tale in a long time and, now that I'm older, it is much more apparent to me the meaning of it.  I didn't realize as a child that Dr. Seuss wanted us to save our Truffula Trees and our Humming Fish!  Go figure.  

Anyway, it is the story of the Once-ler (Greedy Corporate Environment Polluter) and the Lorax (Truffula-Hugging Environmentalist) that go head to head in the fight for the environment.  Unfortunately, all the Truffula Trees are cut down, the Humming Fish are forced to leave and the only hope of a bright future for the environment is that the little boy hearing the story from the Once-ler plant the last Truffula seed to start a new forest.  


So, I guess the moral of the story in Corporate America's eyes is, "If you're going to cut down a tree, plant one in its stead" and from the environmentalist's viewpoint it is, "Don't cut down a tree or touch the environment, just frolic with the Bar-ba-Loots and the Swomee Swans!"  Either way, it's a fun read with a good message.