Slice of Life (Day Three): The New Cold War Kids?

(This is for the Slice of Life challenge, hosted by Two Writing Teachers. We write all through March, every day, about the small moments in the larger perspective … or is that the larger perspective in the smaller moments? You write, too.)

This is one of those slices that will be sort like a mirror of past year slices done on March 3, but from a slightly different angle.

Yesterday was Dr. Seuss’s Birthday Day, and we love that Mad Hat Cat writer around here in Western Massachusetts (where he was born and raised). I often use the opportunity to talk about Allegory with my sixth graders — connecting story to theme to overarching geopolitical ideas. And I almost always share The Butter Battle Book with them, as I did yesterday.

But where as in recent years I could talk about the Cold War and Arms Proliferation as some distant past — way distant for these 11 year olds but not so much for me — this year, I found myself musing over the recent headlines that link Russia and the United States, and we talked about the term “Cold War” coming back around again (particularly with Trump’s push for increased military and more Nukes).

I still appreciate that The Butter Battle Book ends on the unknown … and we talked about why Seuss left that cliffhanger in there. I also wondered if that stalemate between those crazy butter-toast-heads might not yet be something in the near distant future. Are we on a collision course again? I surely hope not. I’d hate to think of my students as the new Cold War Kids.

Peace (sometimes it rhymes),
Kevin

6 Comments
  1. Being from Springfield (Massachusetts) I get the craziness of Dr. Seuss day! I miss it. Your post is eye-opening. Scary. Sad…and so true. It’s a new world.

  2. With Russia our neighbour here in Estonia. I feel there is a underlying feeling of uncertainty here which could be likened to the term ‘cold war’.
    Great band by the way. Their song ‘hospital beds’ is one of my favourites.
    Thanks for sharing the book, would work well with one of our units at school.

    • We have our own uncertainty here .. on more levels than one can count. But given your proximity, I can sense the apprehension of the fault lines on the global stage.
      Kevin

  3. Some of my earliest ‘high-school” poetry shows the worry and intensity we felt in that “old” Cold War. I am hopeful that our new world will not contain another. I want my grandchildren to grow into a world that takes kind care of the earth and its people. Dr. Seuss knew about war, and told us ‘children” a message that I hope we’ll remember in his Butter-Battle story.

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