Have you ever been in an environment where the default answer was “No”? Maybe it was the home you grew up in, a workplace, or a school classroom. Any new idea is so nuts! and wow, crazy!, but a chuckle and awkward pause is followed by—
But what if it wasn’t that way? What if the default answer to a wild whim was an enthusiastic Yes!?
Well, then you’d have the novel Little Women.
The March sisters are fearless in the face of ideas, inspirations, and opportunities. In fact, they thrive on them. The girls grow enamored with Charles Dickens, the sort of J.K. Rowling of their day, and decide it would be delightful to start their own Pickwick Club. In Chapter 10, the author includes their entire newspaper, written by Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy. It has sappy poetry, a mournful elegy for the presumed dead Mrs. Snowball Pat Paw (the family cat), and a weekly report of the girls’ behavior:
Meg—Good.
Jo—Bad.
Beth—Very Good.
Amy—Middling.
In a footnote, Alcott assures her readers that this newspaper is in fact a direct adaptation of a newspaper from her own childhood.
At the end of the chapter, the all-female editorial board decides to admit their neighbor-boy Laurie to the newspaper. To great applause, he announces,
“As a slight token of my gratitude for the honor done me, and as a means of promoting friendly relations between adjoining nations, I have set up a post-office in the hedge in the lower corner of the garden; a fine, spacious building, with padlocks on the doors, and every convenience for the mails,—also the females, if I may be allowed the expression. It’s the old martin-house . . . Letters, manuscripts, books and bundles can be passed in there; and as each nation has a key, it will be uncommonly nice, I fancy.”
A neighborhood newspaper and a friendly post office box? My mind was spinning as I think about The Oaks Academy this fall:
Then it’s a matter of minutes before I’m searching eBay for a cabinet of PO Boxes:
Like the March girls, my heart leapt at the new possibility: “Great applause as [Laurie] deposited a little key on the table and subsided . . . and it was some time before order could be restored.”
Later, the little women are invited to Camp Laurence. A gaggle of young people row downstream to a picnic of croquet, sandwiches, and games of ‘Truth’ and ‘Rigamarole.’ Once again, my mind was whirling as the Marches have a delightful afternoon with friends, creating a rambling absurdity of a story that includes pirates, knitting princesses, and sardine cans filled with pickled knights.
Are there others of you who read books like this? A novel like Little Women isn’t a window into a fantasy world. It is a window into what is possible for our world, if we will only say, Yes! Yes, let’s make our own local paper filled with nonsense, art, and silly inside jokes! Yes, let’s get PO Boxes for inter-campus mail between students! Yes, let’s make time for games like Rigamarole and Truth!
Would Louisa May Alcott approve of this kind of reading of her book? I think the answer is obvious: A hardy Yes!
Say Yes! to Camp Bakewell in July
The July session of Camp Bakewell is just around the corner. There are only a couple of spots left, so Washington County folks, let me know if you’d like your baker to join us for the week (Email me!)
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