Why you absolutely must read Calvin and Hobbes (if you don't already)

I don't know how he does it - maybe a part of his mind never grew up (which is a very good thing!), or maybe he's reliving his childhood through his work, or maybe he's observed children use their imagination in playing - but Bill Watterson nevertheless succeeds in presenting the amazing and adventurous world of a six-year-old boy in his comic strips. And he does it fantastically. It's quite wonderful how your own six-year-old self inside your mind awakens when reading Calvin and Hobbes. It opens your mind to adventure, and even if you don't immediately see stuffed animals come to life around you, you still feel, in some way, that the world is a beautiful and an interesting place full of adventure, despite all.

So regardless of whether you need more positivity in your life or not, you should read Calvin and Hobbes. If you think there's not hope in life, it will bring joy to you and help you see things from a fresh and inspiring perspective. And if you're already happy and have joy and meaning in your life, Calvin and Hobbes will strengthen it. You know why?

Every time you find yourself relating to Calvin in his adventures, you will smile or laugh out loud, sometimes with tears in your eyes. And laughter is like holy water to your soul.

This has happened to me a number of times, for example when Calvin wonders, speaking of himself in the third person of course, whether his eyes' photoreceptors have stopped working or the nature of light has changed. I laughed so hard - I, too, have been accused of black-and-white thinking.

Or when he built those snow monsters in the front yard!

Or - and this was hilarious - when he built a machine that produced a nicer copy of himself that went and wrote Susie a love poem!

Or when the fighter pilot turns out to be a tyrannosaurus!

Or when he plays traffic accident involving a car, a train, an airplane, and a gas explosion!

I could go on but I don't think my zygomaticus majors could take it.

RK