Why am I always so blindsided by the topics that are difficult to talk about with kids? You’d think I’d have some warning, or at least some forethought. Death, why mom and dad are so creaky and old, and why Zippy the Pinhead, Lynda Barry, and Life in Hell are not actually for kids.
Henry discovered Zippy a few months ago and I will read him the cartoons because they are mostly just nonsensical. He (at this point) likes the pictures a lot better than the words. Eli loves to look through our copy of Lynda Barry’s Down the Street though reading him the words is a little trickier (“Ah, yeah, ok, so, what’s happening here is that Marlys is listening to her mom and this other lady talk in the kitchen, and, yeah, ok, so. What? Yeah, she’s…ah…she’s smoking. Which is bad. Very bad. And the lady is…um…saying bad things, and that is surprising Marlys.”) Meanwhile it makes me want to take the book and hide in the bathroom and read it cover to cover because I miss it and forgot how funny it is.
So the boys had discovered the Lynda Barry, and the Zippy, oh, and the Edward Gorey (another that’s very hard to explain), but hadn’t yet found the Life in Hell books, because, well, I know this is totally crazy because I’m almost a librarian, but our books are arranged by size. Hey, I know where they are, ok? Yeah, so the Life in Hell books are on a different shelf. And suddenly they found them and it was like this holy grail of the secret comic stash and they were so interested in everything but here we are telling them that no, these books with child-like drawings of bunnies are not, actually, kid’s books. And there’s Henry saying, “What’s this one called?” and Dave yelling, “Jul? Can you help me here? What are we supposed to do?” and I come in and there’s Henry with School is Hell and you know, we really want him to love school, so do we even tell him the title and put the notion in his head? We did. We’re bad liars, and we do try to tell the kids the truth about stuff.
Anyway. So Eli and Henry have been looking at a bunch of the Matt Groening books for several days now, and Eli was looking at Akbar and Jeff’s Guide to Life, and I said, “Oh, yeah, so that’s Akbar and Jeff” and both of the boys looked at me with very wide eyes and then just fell apart laughing. Eli screamed out, “AKBAR AND JEFF! I DIDN’T KNOW IT WAS AKBAR AND JEFF!” And then I said, “They’re the ones who wear fezzes” and suddenly it was Mom Introduces Hilarious New Words Day and Eli was screaming, “FEZZES???”. They spent the rest of the day chanting, “Akbar and Jeff! Akbar and Jeff!” and for several days now have pretended that they are Akbar and Jeff, and this morning they dressed each other because there’s a comic where Akbar and Jeff dress each other (and, considering Eli had never gotten dressed on his own before today, well then, Akbar and Jeff, I salute you).
We haven’t yet broached the fact that Akbar and Jeff are a couple. I’m pretty sure they think they’re brothers, which is why they’re so happy to pretend to be them.
Dave wondered if they thought it was funny because we think it’s funny that they think it’s funny. But I think that you raise your kids with your sense of humor. I just didn’t realize how early it kicks in.
This was so funny I read it outloud to Sean.
He called your file by size library the “Julie non-Decimal System” 🙂
I love Lynda Barry. She made it though my great book purge. I only kept the ones I knew I would read again and again.