four hands: Alice in Wonderland

RESOLUTION: to preserve my son's childhood with a sense of adventure and tomfoolery

Saturday, July 24, 2010

My first post on this blog was on January 1st this year and it was a bunch of resolutions; ones I wasn't going to make if I wasn't going to keep them. One was 'to preserve my son's childhood with a sense of adventure and tomfoolery.' Adventure for me as a child was always found in books. Unlike TV (not that I don't like TV:), your imagination did all the work and there were no boundaries. You could imagine anything; anything was possible. So, my son and I have been going through some classic books and bringing them to life in our own ways.

For Alice and Wonderland, I got tophats and we decorated them so we could be madhatters. For my photography class last semester, I took some pictures of him in his madhatter state at a recreated hatter tea party in our backyard. He's a great model, don't you think?:) These are scanned from film prints so they look a little different, but you can still see how adorable he is... You might be lucky enough to see me as a madhatter in a future post;)>

Alice in Wonderland

having tea with mr. carroll

Sunday, January 03, 2010

Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.
Alice: …so long as I get somewhere.
The Cat: Oh, you're sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.
I've always thought about how applicable this little conversation is for life. You don't know where you want to go, but you plod along the path anyway expecting that where you end up is going to, by some haphazard fortune, be some place you actually want to be. Wouldn't that be lucky... and unlikely. If you don't know where you're going, should you proceed? The further you go in the wrong direction, the longer it will take to get back on track. If you don't care where you're going, you're sure to end up somewhere, but where? Intention. I want to lead an intentional life, with God-ordained steps. Sure, some surprises along the way would be welcome, and mistakes occasionally excused, but I want my efforts to be, in general, contributory to the overall picture of my life and God's plan for it...

I'm pretty sure that's precisely what Lewis Carroll, (real name: Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), was intending when he wrote it, which is why he's one of those people with whom I would love to have a conversation. "So, Mr. Dodgson, let's discuss the social connotations of the jabberwocky..."

On a lighter note, isn't Alice in Wonderland great?

I love it because I love fairytales...

...and tophats...

...and the other quirky fashion it has inspired...

...like crazy, blue dresses that are a far cry from the prim, little Alice original, not that I don't appreciate her old school style...

...and tea parties (soooo want to have an Alice party sometime)...

...and general eclectic whimsy...

Sigh... I've never watched the Disney cartoon all the way through, but I might some day.
Mientras, I'm looking forward to this one, mainly cuz I know that Johnny Depp rocks every role that he takes on.