And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street

I owe so much to a childhood that had so many obstacles.

I was an odd kid, as my parents and relatives reminded me constantly when I was a failure on the football - yes, soccer - pitch, or chose certain types of music to play at parties, or when I wanted to spend time alone with my favourite books.

And what were those books I enjoyed as a kid?

An atlas and a split dictionary.

My family did not have piles of literature that I could dive into after school, so the first books I read were reference tools that my father owned. The dictionary was divided between ''Lobar'' and ''Lobate'' (look them up), and the atlas was printed in the 1950s (it had a bit of discussion on the conquest of Mt. Everest and that new tricky province now accepted into Canada called Newfoundland). I learned to take in facts and make them a part of my thoughts, a habit that became useful as a college instructor; did not help me assimilate with the normal people out there.

School was a good source for some writing, but it all came from a reader or textbook, and even as a child, I felt very suspicious about the material they wanted us to read. There was a series called Mr. Mugs that was colour-coded according to the grade level and skill of the student who had the book, and many of my classmates clamoured to pass and succeed to the next level. I never really cared either way. They were books designed to teach us lessons, i.e. medicine disguised as candy. The books at home and the phonetic reader we had for one course were much more interesting.

So, I was a loner, even on the page...until...

We visited many relatives when I was a kid, spending time eating, laughing, listening to music, watching TV, and basically showing ourselves to be social and willing to hear the same stories and do the same things over and over again. I did not mind this...except in one particular case. No names will be included here, but I have a clear memory of staying over at their place - where did my parents go? - and feeling that my oddness really was impossible to escape. I was judged on things beyond the reading and the tastes I had: my hair was wrong; my choice of breakfast was unusual (cereal?); I had no love of sports; I preferred to be on my own (gee, I wonder why?).

And then one day, in a quiet little nook under the stairs, I found it.

The Doctor.

I still cannot understand why they had a complete set of Dr. Seuss books almost hidden in that same basement where I spent the night and ate my breakfast. None of their children, as far as I could see, ever read a book (they were surprised at my skills with the literature section of Trivial Pursuit). No one had ever talked about novels, poetry or anything artistic (you take what you can get as a kid of first-generation immigrant parents). And there was something else that even young me could not help but notice:

The books were in order.

I had to check. The series had dates inside the covers - as do all published books, and ''Mulberry Street'' began this particular journey into the amazing work of Theodore Geisel.

Rejected by twenty publishers before being released in 1937, it felt very contemporary and imaginative at the same time (Beatrix Potter was an early fan). The boy who observes all the happenings on the street - Marco, on his way home from school - made me so jealous. Why couldn't I see such things as zebras, elephants, magicians, an over-bearded man, spectacles and the like on the quiet suburban streets we had just moved into? It felt unfair, especially later when I found out it was named after an actual street in Mr. Geisel's hometown. But it led to the imaginative development of a child who was still discovering the power of words.

I know that there is a great deal of controversy about the depictions of certain races and cultures in his work (noting that most of these complaints are not coming from the ones caricatured), but there is still nothing to compare to that early exposure to the magical world of language and character in a Dr. Seuss book.

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You can find more poems, stories, and articles by Kendall Defoe on my Vocal profile. I complain, argue, provoke and create...just like everybody else.

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