Little Golden Families

 

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

-Leo Tolstoy

  

by Janet Scouten

Tolstoy, that master of big, thick Russian novels, knew better than anyone that if you needed enough story to fill an 800-page book, you should start with an unhappy family. There’s nothing like an unhappy family to create the kind of long, complex drama that takes generations to resolve, with plenty of conflict and intrigue to keep a reader turning pages right up to The End.

In contrast, a happy, loving family just doesn’t have the same kind tumult and upheaval required of a sweeping literary epic. And, yet, there are books about happy families in my house that, although they don’t have quite 800 pages, I know for certain I’ve read through them at least 800 times. And every time it’s been with one or both of my little children sitting on my lap.

Children adore books about happy families. They absorb every detail of them, noticing that Bobby has a blue juice cup and Carol has a red one. They notice the round buttons on Mommy’s coat when she’s pushing the baby carriage for their daily walk. They notice Daddy’s brown jacket when he sweeps his little boy onto his shoulders as he walks in the door. They notice everything. And they want to read it again, and again, and again.

 

When I was a child, I pored over such books, soaking in the images of family warmth and coziness. My favorites were the storybooks with round-cheeked children who loved to help Mommy around the house. They followed their mother like little ducklings, helping her sweep the floor or feed the new baby, gently learning about the rhythms and duties of family life.

In one classic Little Golden Book, Baby Dear, a girl is given a doll by her mother and father when they bring their new baby home from the hospital. In this story, the little girl feeds her “baby” when Mommy feeds her baby; she changes her baby’s diapers when Mommy changes her baby; they push their baby carriages together and tuck their babies into bed at the same time.

And in one of the sweetest lines ever written about parenthood, the little girl learns:

We smile at our babies and talk to them. Mommy says this is the way our babies know they are the most wonderful babies in the world.

Is it any wonder that children treasure these books?

The illustrator of Baby Dear—and so many beautiful books just like it—was Eloise Wilkin (1904-1987). From her biography we learn:

“A warm and creative homemaker, Eloise shared with the world glimpses of her big, busy, welcoming household, its rooms papered with gentle patterns, its drop-leaf tables and rocking chairs aglow with hand-rubbed sheen, its four-poster beds covered by hand-stitched quilts. A devoutly religious person, she shared ever so gently her values, her sense of the beauty of order and love, of implicit self-discipline, and of regard for others … She has left us only slightly idealized, rich reminders of a lovely time not very long ago.”

                    -Jane Werner Watson, Eloise Wilkin Stories, afterword

As parents, and parents yet-to-be, isn’t this the kind of home we long to create for our children? And while, being adults, we fully understand that the world holds more than a Russian novel’s worth of pain and suffering, we also understand the need for sanctuaries like those pictured in a Little Golden Book.

More than just “its rooms papered with gentle patterns, its drop-leaf tables and rocking chairs aglow with hand-rubbed sheen,” a safe and happy family home involves constant effort and dedication on the part of the mother and father. It is only through our devout beliefs and our “sense of the beauty of order and love, of implicit self-discipline, and of regard for others” that we can even begin to establish these kinds of households.

Eloise Wilkin didn’t draw for us the behind-the-scenes efforts that built the happy families pictured in her books. But, as parents, we fully understand the extent of the work involved. We understand that it is our job to set the stage on which our children’s early lives are played out. We understand that by creating a safe, loving place for them to acquire and practice the skills they need for life, it will make it easier someday for them to enter this complex world on their own.

While drama and intrigue does make for an incredible novel, it is instead the stability and—yes—predictability of a happy family that our children need and long for so deeply. Happy families may not be terribly exciting to the outside world, but to those within them, they are certainly counted among God’s greatest gifts.

Is it any wonder that we treasure them so?