Meryl Streep is in the news this week for her speech at the Golden Globes. It’s a powerful piece — though, truth be told, I think she could read out a phone directory and it would be powerful. She began by apologizing because she’d lost her voice. It was loud enough to hear, but certainly rough. I was overcome by an urge to make tea with honey while watching.
Listening to her made me think of the cassette tape we had of her reading of The Velveteen Rabbit when our kids were small. I think we received it as a gift the Christmas I was pregnant with #1 Son. I might’ve even listened to it during labor, now that I think about it. In the early stages anyway.
It is soothing in the extreme. A beautiful story…accompanied by George Winston’s December album…stellar narration; it is an astounding package. And our sweet baby listened to it every night at bedtime for the first several years of his life. I’m tempted to credit this cassette tape and Winnie-the-Pooh, which he listened to at naptime, with the reason he’s such a gentle giant of a young man.
We travelled with The Velveteen Rabbit and a small boombox with that kid — he needed it to go to sleep at night. We used it like a drug on car trips. It seldom failed us. We listened to it so often that the recording became hard to hear, which had the effect of making you listen all the harder. Truly, by the time the boy could talk, we probably could have recited the story, though not with the lovely inflection Meryl Streep conveys, of course.
We tried using it with Child #2, as well, but the recording had been loved much, and had not become real, as the Velveteen Rabbit and Skin Horse had, so much as unintelligible. You could still hear Winston’s piano, but the story didn’t quite come through. By age three, Darling Daughter often said it made her feel too sleepy and asked that it be turned off. (She has never slept as soundly or as long as her brother.…)
I have several copies of this sweet story in book form — various artists have illustrated it and I have large format books and smaller, too. I don’t recall reading it to either child, however. I love to read aloud, and this is a favorite story of mine…but who can compare to Meryl Streep? Plus, seldom do I have someone in my living room at the piano to accompany my narration.…
But I’m so glad our kids had this story in their life in the way they had it. Meryl Streep and George Winston spinning Margery Williams’ magical tale of love and childhood…well, I can’t think it gets much better than that.