I’m writing this post at 01:17 on Monday 31st May 2021 after watching two childhood films with my mum which I swear not to ever have watched. Not to have watched in fear of being a “girl”, in fear of being a “wuss” mostly afraid of being myself.
Little Lewis was innocent, he loved his toy cars, he loved his soft toys and especially his two toy pandas. I feel like I am making myself vulnerable right now, but that’s okay because it’s me. My two pandas are my life, I do not know what I would do without them, when life was shit and everything was rotten they were there, so soft, they had that comforting smell and feel about them. They were safe.
Tonight, me and mum watched Winnie the Pooh from 1977 and Christopher Robin from 2018. My god, I almost teared up in both of them, mostly the end part where Christopher said “Goodbye” to his toys when he went to Boarding School. I almost teared, and we soon put on the next film with the same scene repeated, Another chance to say goodbye.
To me, that scene represents a few things; a goodbye to his childhood as he is moving onto being a young adult, a goodbye to his toys in shame which his character personality shows later on in the film. I relate to him to a degree being that I remember many days when I had to leave to go to school I used to say “goodbye” in case anything bad happened. There was never going to be a goodbye to them but there was to my childhood.
You are a kid, you develop into a teenager, then you transform to an adult -but what happens to your childhood, do you just leave it? Do you talk about it? Do you wish to re-live parts of it?
Watching these films, my dad didn’t want to and I would be lying if I said that he may have thought that I was a wuss or a pussy or whatever what, but I don’t care.
I never watched these two immensely important films as a kid, I wish that I did nonetheless. But they showed me so much; diversity, feelings, emotions, how to express them, how others express them etc and most importantly to hang onto this.
My childhood was hard, complexed and troubled yet there are some memories I wish to only be able to relive.
Watching these films tonight I felt a small part of Little Lewis which was lost. Little Lewis watching the films, enjoying them, smiling and laughing. Little Lewis, It’s hard to remember who you were but I can see you far in sight. I know that you just wanted to have fun and enjoy what you liked.
There were many scenes/part(s) In both Winnie the Pooh and Christopher Robin which I loved but one in particular right at the end was when Christopher showed that he is not ashamed to have toys, he isn’t ashamed to remember his childhood.
At first he didn’t believe that Pooh was there, he wanted to carry on with his professional life which he yet didn’t realise he was just treading water and had lost himself.
He lost who he was, and he needed his childhood to come up to water to remind him.
I believe my true self is who I was growing up, who I was before trauma, before shit.
Little Lewis is in me, and I’m going to get him out.