My favorite fairy tale is and will always be Little Red Riding Hood. I have often wondered why--I mean, it's a dark and strange tale with a fairly violent ending. You know it: A girl lives in a deep dark forest with possibly her mother. She is told to bring some freshly baked goods to her grandmother. In my mind the route is much like the one to our own grandmother's house...through a cow path, under fences, over stone walls...The girl wears a red cape with a hood, hence the name Red Riding Hood.
Well, Red dallies, picking flowers and kicking stones along the path and eventually does arrive at her Gran's cabin in the woods. But, apparently because she has taken so long, a wild wolf has beaten her to the cabin and gulped up poor old granny whole.
The wolf then poses as Gran, even dressed up AS GRAN in her night cap, long cotton night gown and wire spectacles. And we all know what happens next--Red Riding Hood notices that her grandmother's looks have significantly changed since the last they met. So Red questions the wolf, "Oh, my, Grandmother! What big EYES you have!" (and all the rest)
Red is wise to the wolf's answers and although they leave kids these days shaking in their boots, she soldiers on because this was a long, long time ago and kids were braver back then (and possibly more foolish.) Red doesn't get to save herself or her gran the way modern re-told fairy tale heroines do--instead a wood cutter gets that job. Axe strikes. Gran pops out of the wolf's belly and all is right in the fairy tale world.
Peace is returned to the cabin in the woods. The birds start to chirp. Wee chipmunks come out from under dried leaves and scurry about. A gentle breeze comes along and little children everywhere learn the life lesson that they are not to dally when sent on an errand through the deep dark woods. They are to go STRAIGHT THERE and come STRAIGHT BACK...or something very sinister will happen. Not only to them, but to their elders!
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