Pooh on the Window Ledge

Margi was one of four eight-year-old campers in my first-ever cabin as a counselor at Camp Green Cove, Junior 1. In arts-and-crafts, she made this wonderful little Winnie-the-Pooh for me. I've always set it in my kitchen or on my bedroom chest-of-drawers. Here, he has a place of honor in my window just above my kitchen sink.
 I see him many times of the day, and I remember Margi and summer camp and my friend Susan Little and my mother (who read me Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner.

Susan and I became friends at camp, where on days off at 17, we paraded down the main street of Hendersonville, North Carolina, in yellow rain slickers and high black waders. We loved dressing like Christopher Robin and leaving "sustaining missages" on the Lodge tables at meals and delivering them at activities and reading Pooh stories at campfire. Indeed, when a new building was added to Junior Line, we christened it "The House at Pooh Corner" and renamed the cabins after Hundred Acre Wood sites.

Susan died years ago after suffering from multiple sclerosis, and my niece and nephew never loved Pooh as much as I. However, there are four little ones in the family now, and soon I plan to start reading them A. A. Milne's stories about his son's stuffed animals and then illustrated in books by the wonderful E. H. Shepard before they get indoctrinated by the awful Disney versions.