I’ve always loved Little Golden Books. The kittens are wild with sunshine, the elephants are saggy, and the strawberry shortcake fed puppies are pokey. The wholesome and sweetly illustrated classics look very Vegas when grouped in a stack on my kids’ bookshelves. The spines gleam gaudily but grab their attention.
One title I want to add to my kids’ library is The Monster at the End of this Book, by Jon Stone. It was one of my favorites as a child. Grover is the terrified and clueless star of the story as he tries to prevent the reader from reaching the end of the book because there is a monster lurking there. He nails the pages shut, ties them with ropes, builds a brick wall, wails, shrieks, and begs the reader to not turn the next page. Every page brings the reader closer to the end of the book, which spells certain doom in Grover’s view.
The last page is next. Grover is a puddle, a worthless bag of blue fuzz. His imagination, his worry, his fear has conquered him and there is nothing more he can do than scream. The reader turns the page, revealing the monster.
It is Grover.
Oops, ha ha. The monster created by Grover’s dread and fearful anticipation is imaginary. There was never anything to fear.
When I first found out I was pregnant again, this book popped into my head. I looked at the months ahead as pages I could either try to nail shut out of fear for what was at the end, or I could let the pages turn freely. Every pregnancy ends, but not every pregnancy results in blessed relief and joy. To those of us who are intimately acquainted with the other side of ending, it is easy to assume it will happen again. Each page turns, each milestone flies by but we find ourselves not relaxing. We feel like the stakes are a little higher. I’ve felt the baby move and if the worst happens now, I will forever feel those sensations in phantom form.
There is no monster at the end, however. I am the one creating the fear, the dread, the worries. I am the one mixing the cement and building the brick wall. It is futile and ridiculous because the smallest sigh at midnight is a wrecking ball. Down tumbles the wall, out pop the nails. I try ropes and steel-riveted barriers. Tomorrow comes.
So, what if there is a monster at the end of this book? What will it look like?
It could rip me apart limb-from-limb. It could devour me, bury me, carry me away.
I pretend I would stare it down and study it, invite it to dinner and then excuse myself to the washroom where I shimmy out the window, leaving it with the check. I’d spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder. Maybe I would try to wrestle it to the ground and use some of my page-tying rope to bind the hairy arms. But I’d have to go back regularly and make sure the knots were still tight.
Maybe, when I get there, the monster will simply be me. I will realize how unfair it was to rob myself of the joy of the moment, the peace that comes when I rest in my Father’s arms.
As I anticipate the future, this book keeps popping up in my memories and I think it is no accident. I have been the fearfully pleading Grover begging for mercy from the monster at the end. Even as a child I readily understood what an idiot he was being—his own worst enemy.
No matter what the future holds, I can be kind to myself and my unborn baby this minute, this hour, this day by not picking up my hammer. Someday this baby may sit in my lap as I read the story to him or her. Silly Grover! he or she might say.
Silly, indeed.