Your Kid is Obtuse? You Need Some Seuss!

If you grew up reading Dr. Seuss you cannot forget his writing even if you want to.  Try to block out Seuss and you’ll soon realize that it is impossible.  The harder I try, the more stupid rhymes my mind creates.  Try it, and you may I say, try it but it won’t go away.  Seuss poems are etched into my cortex.  His work is so thoroughly embedded into my gray matter that I can recite many of the books from memory.  This talent is not appreciated by my son.  He insists that I hold the book.  Seuss books are part of his bedtime ritual.  It’s also one of the reasons he has becoming such a centered and cool little kid.  Screw modern philosophers.  Seuss will point your kids in the right direction.

Back before Jim Carey made him spin in his grave, Dr. Seuss was a wholesome source of entertainment that covertly delivered messages of self confidence, fair play and loyalty.  I say covert because the stories delivered some great lessons of life without being too preachy or dogmatic.  You don’t need a sappy purple dinosaur to teach kids to live well. If you haven’t joined the party Sam-I-am, allow me to summarize some of the best lessons.
 
1. Green Eggs and Ham.  You only think you know everything?  Try something new, you might like it even if you think you don’t.

2. Horton Hears a Who.  Be loyal and committed even when the rest of the world can’t see the reason why.  You aren’t crazy, they are.

3. Horton Hatches an Egg.  Keep your promises and good things will happen.  

4. The Sneetches (and Other Stories).  We are all valuable regardless of our outward appearance.  Forget the star shaped bling.  What matters is inside you.

5. Yurtle the Turtle.  Bullies don’t win in the end.  Mistreat your fellow man (or turtle) and you will end up face down in the mud.

6. The Lorax.  Greed is bad.  If you don’t take care for the things around you they will disappear and you will end up being an agoraphobic dressed in homemade clothing.

7. Oh, the Places You’ll Go.  Oh yes, life can suck, but it can also be a wondrous realm of excitement.  Your success is 98 ¾% guaranteed if you press forward and participate in the grand adventure of life. 

8. How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  Christmas does not come from a store and bad people can’t kill the Christmas spirit

9. What was I Scared Of?  There is nothing to fear but fear itself.  Better yet, sometimes the things we fear most turn out to be something we’ll actually like.

10. The Zax.  Are you stubborn and unyielding?  Don’t care about the opinions or needs of others?  Fine, be that way. 

Life will pass you by. Whether they realize it or not, the lessons in these stories will stick with you kids for years.  Some of these stories are long enough that sleepy ones will be out cold before you reach the back cover. Fortunately they are short enough that Hollywood won’t screw them up with another lousy movie adaptation.