Lessons learned from the Snowman of the Forest

Okay, just one more post about this story and then I'll get back to normal blogging fare (whatever that is). Perhaps someday I'll get up the courage to share my own stories on this blog. Until then, here's a big thank you to Leslie for letting me have a little fun with this story. It's honestly not that bad for an 11-year-old. You had a pretty good command of the English language.

That being said, there were a lot of things that I learned from this unfinished tale. Such as:

Skills one should develop when one is half of ten:

• How to use the telephone
• How to know when to pack your belongings in case of a fire
• Fire safety
• How to make delicious meals out of food storage
• How to make friends with deer
• How to make a skirt from leaves (especially one that is warm enough for the winter)
• How to find leaves to make said skirt in the dead of winter
• How to skin an animal
• How to sew a dress from a shoestring and a dead deer
• How to hold a funeral service for deer
• How to train a deer to "use his expressions"
• How to make a deerskin dress white

Skills that do not matter so much:

• Knowing the alphabet past the letter 'E'
• Knowing how to walk to town for help

Facts I was not aware of:

• Police regularly leave little girls alone in the woods after they investigate the death of the girl's parents
• Babies make things more pleasant for 5-year-old girls who have just been orphaned
• Puppies bark after they are killed by hunters
• People like to have Christmas feasts outside in the forest
• Deer accept little girls as one of their own
• When you live in the forest by yourself with almost no supplies, you need an excuse to go to town
• You can judge someone's age by their footprints (okay, I sort of knew that)

I hope someday I can be as talented as Angelica.