Die Storie van ‘Real’

hierdie is mooiste Blanks (voor en na). My seuntjie se geliefde lappie en vertroueling vir die afgelope vyf jaar. Hy is lief vir Blanks – regtig lief – en so het ek ook lief geword vir Blanks. Soms word Blanks net aan ‘n punt saam gesleep op een of ander avontuur of soms styf gefrommel in sy hand. Gereeld word hy onder sy neus gedruk in die holte van sy twee handjies en dan asem hy vir Blanks diep in (want Blanks ruik soos veilig en bekend). Hy was al herkenbaar room-kleurig en onherkenbaar bruin.

 

Blanks se gunsteling speletjie is wegkruipertjie. Dit het al vir lang trane en gefrustreerde ouers besorg, want mamma en pappa wil nie meer laat-aand wegkruipertjie speel nie! Maar lojale ‘Boomerang-Blanks’ kom altyd weer terug.

 

En Blanks vertel op die mooiste moontlike manier die storie van ‘Real’:

 

“‘Real isn’t how you are made,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.’

‘Does it hurt?’ asked the Rabbit.

‘Sometimes,’ said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. ‘When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.’

‘Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,’ he asked, ‘or bit by bit?’

‘It doesn’t happen all at once,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.'”

– The Velveteen Rabbit