Big Bear Cosmology

We (re)discovered a new DVD series, "The Big Bear in the Blue House." M isn't enamoured with BBITBH; he doesn't like The Big Bear's voice, or the songs. I like it; it's less, um, hyper-saccharine than Barney and everyone's nice to everyone else.

I think, to borrow from Judith Viorst, that Watching Tweety and Sylvester "is a wonderful thing, but not yet." Also, I'm about ready to scream if I have to answer one more character motivation question about Sylvester the cat (he wants to eat Tweety). Or Donald Duck (he gets mad and makes bad choices; repeat ad nauseam). Or why musketeers clack swords (they're practicing to kill people). Don't get me wrong; I'm really looking forward to the day I can sit down with A and watch Wiley Coyote seriously injure himself chasing after the Road Runner. I just don't want to have to explain it ten time a day for the next three years.

There's just one problem. The episode of BBITBH we first watched has a Big Storm blowing a tree into the Library. Luckily, the storm happens "off stage" before the episode begins. Unfortunately, the small bear (puppet), Ojo, is sufficiently good at conveying her distress at having a large oak tree lying sideways in the middle of the town library that A picked it up. He seemed upset by the concept of storms as well as by trees juxtaposed with libraries. (It turns out our friends with girls around A's age also had a problem with this particular episode.)

I'd just gotten A more or less settled down when Luna, the Moon, appeared to sing the Goodbye Song with the Big Bear (the way they end the show). Oh. My. God. High drama when Luna zoomed up and away out of the screen. A turned to me, his face in the flushed "I'm trying to be tough and 'OK'" face. "Where did the moon go? Why did the moon leave?" Then he burst into tears.

Granted, he's been fighting a cold the last few days, so he's more volatile than usual; but I think it's taken about a day to establish that the Moon in the Sky is something different from Luna the Moon Puppet (which is her name in this house). It helped that the next day was a clear day, and I used Portable Stonehenge to help A find the moon in the sky.

Speaking of the night sky, I need to get to bed; A and I have developed some kind of psychic link -- for every hour I stay up past 11 PM, he gets up before 6 AM.