Editor’s Note: Maria is taking a few weeks off to finish a book project. In the interim, we will be rerunning some of her columns, because we really do think they are that good. This weekend’s selection was originally published Dec. 24, 2011. If you have a favorite article of Maria’s you’d like to suggest, please comment below. — Amanda
By Maria Padhila
In 10 years, I’ve read a lot of books with my daughter. She was the type who wanted about 10 picture books before going to sleep (and Go The Fuck To Sleep had not been written yet. As incorrect as it is, I love that book, with its progressively weirder menagerie and shared caretaker despair: “You do so much other amazing shit. Why can’t you just go to sleep?”).
Most of the time I was fine with this — I love reading, and I like the chance to try on different voices, have her point to things, etc. On my lap in the rocking chair with a book is pretty much how she spent about a third of the first four years of her life.
Recently, I gave another big sack of books away — we save the most beautiful and most meaningful ones. But often, as we look the old books over, we wonder what we ever saw in them. One that was read over and over at school, but not so much at home, is If You Give a Mouse A Cookie. It had left both of us with kind of mixed feelings. We veered between thinking the mouse was cute, or scary looking. We ping-ponged between finding his neediness and many requests poignant or overwhelming.
Was the mouse a jerk or was he worth the trouble? Could we see ourselves in him? And where were our cookies?
If you’re not familiar with this classic work, it’s the cautionary tale of a mouse who, when given a cookie, asks for a glass of milk, and then his requests begin to pile on, each to the last, until they reach a height of absurdity. It’s a formula that got played out several times by the author and has been awarded by both acclaim and book sales.
And I found it referenced in an excellent polyamory blog. The Polyamorous Misanthrope really has to be called authoritative. It provides advice, comment and the occasional guest columnist. And most of the wisdom found there can apply to most any relationship. Who doesn’t need to hear, once in a while, things like: “Look out for some warning signs that say that what you’re experiencing is a boundary violation rather than intimacy,” or “Good relationships require good boundaries, no matter what the relationship form”?