Nothing to See Here…

No, silly, not YOU! I’m not saying I’ll love YOU forever (because, really, I hardly know you). I’m talking about the children’s book by this title.

It’s a best seller. I believe they’ve sold seventy gazillion to the 10th power or something. In fact, when your baby is born, they issue one directly to the infant at the hospital. “Here you go, baby. Here are your diaper coupons, your formula samples, your really ugly-but-free Similac diaper bag, and oh - don’t forget your copy of Love You Forever.

Here’s the deal: this book is CREEPY.

Oh, I know. I’m breaking some sort of sacred vow of motherhood by saying that. There was some meeting a long time ago whereby every mother had evidently agreed to just LOVE this book to pieces and cry whenever she read it. And yeah, I signed the contract and everything but here I am telling you - C-R-E-E-P-Y.

It doesn’t start out creepy. I mean, the mommy obviously loves the baby. A lot. And she sings this sweet song and, man, it brings a tear to your eye. Even when that sweet baby turns into an evil toddler (as if unrolling the toilet paper is the worst they can deliver!) the dedicated and loving mommy still sings the song and loves the child. Say it with me: Awwwwwwwww….

But somewhere after that, the book goes terribly, terribly wrong…. (did I mention c-r-e-e-p-y?).

When the ‘boy’ is a grown man? Yeah, there is a picture of the mother with a ladder climbing into his window so she can come hold him and rock him and sing that song (which, by now, has a sort of a STALKER feel to it, really).

And guess what? The book doesn’t go into any police arrest or 72-hour hold commitment papers or discussions about THERAPY. Nope, it just goes on like it’s normal for a mother with a grown child to commit some breaking and entering so she can rock a man twice her size and sing him a lullaby. (c-r-e-e-p-y).

There is an attempt at recovery. Yeah, the woman gets too old and feeble to tote a ladder around and keep up with the B&E activities so she stays home and calls her grown son to come see her. And he does. Say it with me - Awwwwwww. He even holds her and rocks her and sings her the song. Which is really kind of touching for someone like me who is 40 and thinking “But who will rock me when I’m old and feeble?” But remember - this is a book meant to read to children. I mean, when you’re a toddler, it must be scary enough to have to depend on other human beings to feed you and wipe your little butt clean. I really don’t think it’s fair to take that dependent child and pile on the bad news “Hey, junior, before too long, you’ll be feeding me and wiping MY butt clean! Whaddya think about THEM apples?”

No, that particular bit of news really should be saved and sprung onto the child while in his teenage years (maximum impact and all that, trust me - you’ll need every weapon in your arsenal during those years!).

I’m thinking that if you have a child with any amount of intelligence (and let’s face it - mine are all BRILLIANT), here’s what they will take out of that book:

My mother loves me so much, but at some point she’ll become just a really intrusive busy body and then, yeah, when she reaches a certain age I take back ALL the power! PAYBACK. Oh, and when I move out? I’m takin’ all the ladders.

I’m not reading this book to my kids. Uh-uh. No way I’m giving the little ankle biters any more IDEAS. It’s bad enough that I’ve taught them to talk. They needn’t know that when I get old they will take back the power and have the opportunity to pay me back for every time-out, every ‘maybe later’, every ‘because I said so’. Let them pay for therapy to work out those mommy-dearest issues like everyone else.

I’m thinking maybe I’ll give this book out to the trick-or-treaters on Halloween, ’cause did I mention? C-R-E-E-P-Y.