Childhood Mythology #5: Calvin & Hobbes

While the Redwall series may be the reason that my imagination has run amok, I owe the ability of imagination to Calvin & Hobbes. Some of the happiest moment of my life are when I was in my room at night, reading these comics, and getting ideas about what I could do in the forest the next day, or how I could anger my next babysitter, or how to play the greatest game in the world: Calvinball.

My first experience with Calvin and his friend Hobbes was on a family vacation in California. My father received a gift from someone, I can't, for the life of me, remember what it was for, but it was a copy of The Essential Calvin & Hobbes, a name which I mispronounced until 6th grade (I always said "essital"). It sat there, in the backseat of the old Pontiac, for a long time. It was a big book, so I was rather intimidated to read it at first, but then I saw it was a comic book, and thought, "This must be what all my friends are reading! I'll check it out." It was then, at the tender age of...well, I can't really remember how old I was. I was young, pre-pubescent, and had no imagination. Let's leave it at that.

It was then that I saw what I kid my age should be doing. We shouldn't be worried about parents, other kids, or even grades (although it took me a little longer to learn that one). We should just run around and play silly games and have imaginary friends. Who cares what the world thinks when you are the master of your own little world?

I began to relate to Calvin in many ways, and what's more, I wanted to be Calvin, yet I was too chicken to perform many of the acts that the eternal six-year old saw as commonplace. Even as I grew older, I began to appreciate all the more the genius of Watterson, and that is why I believe the return of Calvin & Hobbes is one of the most optimistic events of the year.

Like many of you, I still adore the series, and the insight it has to offer into humanity. It served as yet another form of escapism, but I was escaping to something that I wanted to be. Calvin used his imagination not to run from the world, but to see the world in a way that it should be seen: as downright absurd. He was a master in an art that I still struggle to perform adequately.

So, to you Mr. Watterson, and to you, Calvin and Hobbes; I thank you.