Letter to Kate DiCamillo

Dear Ms. DiCamillo,

Thank you for your books. I have been reading them to my kids, and I couldn't have chosen a better author's work. We started with The Tale of Desperauex and followed it up with Because of Winn Dixie. Last night, we finished The Miraculous Adventure of Edward Tulane. We will soon be looking for your other works, and eagerly await a new book.

I loved Despereaux. It was a story that any age could appreciate, and I appreciated the way you introduced a few rare words and explained their meaning with both a definition and then an example in the story. You are not only making my kids smarter, you are making me smarter as well. Thank you.

A few days later, I was reading (alone) about Da Vinci, and the author described Da Vinci's dark/light contrasts as "Chiaroscuro". I found elsewhere that chiaroscuro can be used to produce depth and dimensions in light. To transpose those concepts from art to your story made so much more sense, and I have to tell you how impressed I am by the layers of your story. I am sure that if we reread the book again we will be pleasantly surprised with details and ideas that we missed before.

We went to the movies to see The Tale of Despereaux, and I was sorry to see how they changed your story. The kids were disappointed, too. I understand the need for small changes to translate a story from book to film, but I think they unnecessarily changed the most valuable aspects of your story to "dumb it down" for the movie-goer.

Winn Dixie was a great read, and the underlying values that can be learned are exactly what I want my kids to learn. Thank you!

It is rare for me to cry. Every once in a while, a movie can get to me. I can only think of one book that made me cry before reading about Edward Tulane. That other book was a biography of Carl Sagan, and I cried when he had to say good-bye to his kids before he died prematurely. Your book made me cry twice. I cried about Sarah Jean, and then I cried as Abilene and Edward meet again. Actually, I almost lost it while reading the Coda. My kids had never seen me cry, and they didn't quite understand it, but I think it was a good experience for them. Now they know I'm not as tough as I pretend to be.

More importantly, the lesson of Edward Tulane is of the most important lessons in life (top three lessons, for sure.) It is also the most difficult to put into words, and oftentimes our actions are not enough to teach this lesson. Unfortunately, many people must learn this lesson the hard, just like Edward.

The antique doll had a great many stories to tell, didn't she? With that much time on earth and that many cracks in her china, she must have a treasure trove to pull from when she needs to remind herself that she has been loved, that she has loved, and that life can be really good if your let it.

I can't help but wonder where Bryce went. I wonder what lesson Bryce can teach us? When he is forty years old, is a successful and generous man (a Jean Valjean) or a miserable and bitter drunk reliving his father's life?

Thank you again, Kate DiCamillo. They tell me that reading to my children will pay untold dividends. I am sure that those dividends are multiplied when I am reading your books to them. May your muse continue to inspire you with great tales, great values, and great wordsmithing.

Happiness

Of course, I want to teach my kids everything I know: especially the knowledge I gained the hard way. But what if you could only teach them one thing? [Don't focus on why you can only teach them one thing, just humor the exercise and isolate the most important thing you know.

I found this aphorism from Michel de Montaigne that captures the one thing I think my offspring need to know:

The man who is happy is not he who is believed to be so but he who believes he is so. (Geary's Guide to the World's Greatest Aphorisms by James Geary, page 128.)

If I had known this principle as a younger man, I could have wasted less time and focused more on lasting happiness. The quick-fix happiness I sought in booze, girls, games, food, TV, and many other trivial pursuits did not return anything over time.

Imagine your happiness is measurable. Your happiness starts at zero, and you have a beer to push it up to a "1". After six beers, are you at a happiness level of "6"? Maybe, but there is a law of diminishing returns that applies here. At some point, you have one too many beers. The hangover itself will sap your happiness level, and that is in addition to any errors of judgement you may have committed while intoxicated. No matter what, you always lose the happiness that each beer brought. Beer/Food/Drugs/etc do not leave a residual happiness, they wear off.

Reset your happiness meter and lets try another exaple. Starting at "0" you turn on TV and find a new episode of your favorite TV show. Happiness level soars to a "10" while the show is on, drops to a "5" immediately after, and then registers a zero once it has left your short-term memory. If you were supposed to be doing something else instead of watching TV at that time, then the drop off will be steeper and deeper. TV does not produce a residual happiness.

Now a better way, in my opinion: Do something for a relationship that you don't feel like doing. Give a back rub, cook something that you don't like but that person does, listen to a boring story enthusiastically, or let them control the TV remote tonight. The happiness meter starts at zero, plunges into negative numbers for a brief time, and then slowly climbs to about a "2". Two years later, you recall a time when you did this selfless act and find that it still provides a residual level "2" happiness. If you can amass an impressive history of selfless acts, you will notice two things. First, they add up to a higher level of residual happiness (which means they cause your happiness to sit at a constant level "10" or higher, even in the darkest of times. Second, the object of your selfless acts will probably reciprocate, which both spikes your happiness and raises the residual happiness level.

My young kids can't really learn it yet. They have a lot of living to do before they know how true this aphorism is. Therefore, the best way for me to teach them now is by my example. I hope they see me working on my happiness, and actively choosing happiness. I hope that they intuitively choose happiness, regardless of what their friends say or what conventional wisdom has decided. I hope that they see the difference between short-term happiness and long-term happiness.

2009 may be a really hard year. If it is, I think I am ready to be happy anyway. I am hoping that everyone is surprised by how well 2009 treats us, and that happiness comes easily. If not, I plan to keep investing in those long-term happiness builders that I find with my kids, wife, extended family, charity, and self-improvement.

I hope your 2009 is filled happiness! Thanks for reading my blog.