Falling Asleep Under the Love Umbrella – by Clare Millar
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The first book I give H is a picture book. I vividly remember my favourite teacher librarian showing Bamboozled by David Legge to my class – I must have only been six or seven. The book is a little older than me.
H isn’t drawn to books these days, having let reading fall to the side during uni, but I give the book to him on the way to my place. It’s autumn, but feels like winter already, and we shiver on the bus. There’s just enough light to read against the darkness outside. We comment on the illustrations of the nineties tracksuit and hair scrunchie the girl wears as she visits her grandfather.
On every spread, there is more to find in the topsy-turvy world of this book. The girl is mowing the grass inside; the rug is a pond; the armchair is a man in a suit; the garden gnome rides a goose. Later, I ask H what he likes most about it and he refers to the final page – the grandfather’s house is just a silly island in a small part of the normal world, and visiting grandparents feels like being on that island.
I am distracted. We get off the bus two stops late.
Months later, H’s mum tells me that when he was very little, he stubbornly slept with books instead of toys.
~
When I move into a new apartment in Clifton Hill, I buy a print from Under the Love Umbrella by Davina Bell, illustrated by Allison Colpoys. I spend a while choosing, and settle on one that is quite simple. An adult holds a small child’s hand. The adult holds a large umbrella – each segment is a different colour, bright against the rain.
The umbrella is large enough to protect both of them and there’s enough room for several more children. Importantly, the white space shows just how much love and attention the parent has for this child; that although there is room for more people, it is this relationship right here that is most deserving of love, even in the rain. The text from this spread reads: ‘in every weather, it is us together’.
Colpoys’ illustrations have a comforting, homemade feel. Often, there’s a tangle of colours or a line escaping just past the edge of an object. A batch of cookies made in your grandmother’s kitchen probably wouldn’t be perfectly round; veggies from the garden won’t shine as bright as those from the supermarket, but they will taste like a whole concerto.
I place this print in a pink IKEA frame that draws out the bright purples and oranges of the book. The frame sits above my bed, surrounded by smaller postcards. Every night, I fall asleep under the love umbrella – sometimes alone, sometimes with space for someone I love.
“Every night, I fall asleep under the love umbrella – sometimes alone, sometimes with space for someone I love.”
At their core, many picture books are about love and stability, even if they test the boundaries at times, exploring the wild things. It can be difficult to express or understand love at any age. Little and Big Nutbrown Hare take turns attempting to quantify how much they love each other, until there are no possible words except ‘to the moon and back’. The love umbrella, however, needs very few words – it is always big enough, no matter the distance between people, to catch and hold love. ‘There’s so much room here just for you under my love umbrella.’
~
On our first date, in January, we’re back at his place. I notice a poster on H’s wall. It’s an enveloping dark brown. A creature with one enormous eye and two soft horns is drawing a line in the dirt with a stick. On top of the creature is a bird-like thing, with a lightbulb for a head. I know it has to be the work of Shaun Tan.
I wonder how I’ve ended up in a guy’s room – wanting desperately to kiss him more – when we both know Tan’s style well. H’s work has done a few projects with Shaun Tan, he explains. I tell him about a stage show I went to years ago – an experimental musical adaptation of The Arrival. If this goes well, I think, there’s an exhibition in March we could go to together.
The following week he’s at my house, and I suggest starting on a Shaun Tan puzzle that I’ve never attempted. It’s only 750 pieces, so I think we could be done in a few hours. I forget, as always, that puzzles frustrate me, and I am inundated by Tan’s use of colour; so much cream that becomes pink, grey that becomes brown, all feeling vaguely like fairy floss and grapes, or maybe rosé.
A month or so later, H gives me a matching poster.
~
Some time ago, an ex and I were interested in philosophy for children, and we bought an academic book on philosophy in children’s literature. He loved it, but I never ended up reading it. Had I looked further than the contents page, I’d have found insightful analyses of Dr Seuss, Shel Silverstein, the Frog and Toad books, The Rainbow Fish, and many other well-known picture books. While knowing there is philosophical merit to many of these books, I find myself wanting to experience them like a child again.
“While knowing there is philosophical merit to many of these books, I find myself wanting to experience them like a child again.”
When everything curdled between me and my ex, I turned to Under the Love Umbrella the most, reminding myself that the world is full of love. I felt more love for my friends and family, and knew that someday my umbrella would open wide enough for someone else too maybe enough for a family of my own.
~
In February, I take a professional development workshop on editing children’s books, led by Davina Bell. She suggests that what a child needs from a book – and from adults more generally – is to know: you are loved, you have worth, and the world is absolutely better because you are in it. This becomes the rhythm of my life.
~
I always thought it was strange that I loved children’s books but didn’t want children. After some time with H, this comes more to my mind. Perhaps a little family would be lovely. The planet may be dying, but maybe we could fill the end of our days with more love. I read and worry about the future of the climate and wonder whether love is enough; but I struggle to accept the idea of a world with substantially fewer children – less joy, less learning and less impetus to change.
Through my work as a bookseller, I know that picture books are more likely to feature animals than children or families of colour. I make a rule for building a library for my hypothetical family: for every book with animals, I must find another that shows the world as it really is – with families of different races, religions, sexualities, genders, and visible and invisible disabilities. I want my child to read the names of all the trees and birds we have left, to learn kindness and buzz with curiosity for all the things my adult self has already forgotten. Maybe we’ll read a picture book from every country in the world.
“I want my child to read the names of all the trees and birds we have left, to learn kindness and buzz with curiosity for all the things my adult self has already forgotten.”
I start to see myself in the future with a baby and decide I’ll keep a record of every book we read. I don’t know whether that will be a daily record – of reading the same favourites over and over – or just a numbered list, until we get to the magical thousand books before starting school. There’s far more to a child – to a family – than books, but I want to remember the stories my child loved as they grew.
I buy picture books more frequently, knowing just how many I’ll want in the future. Hardbacks with bright colours and soft characters draw me in, but I have a wistful idea of childhood, and our child will probably love farts even more than H does. I imagine my grandpa (still scandalously agile, I hope) constructing the perfect nursery bookshelf with me, devising how to fit as many books as possible without them toppling.
I think this type of visualising is a symptom of love.
~
In April, H and I are at a bar in Preston. It’s the first time I’ve ever been properly drunk around him. Words slip out of me, faster than usual. I’m wearing a big red coat with a giant hood and could be a fairy tale character myself.
We both order a cocktail known as The Pav – honeycomb and toffee vodka, passionfruit, lemon, and aquafaba for a foam, with a single raspberry and leaf of mint on top. It tastes as though I am drinking a wondrous potion. I desperately want to gulp it down but force myself to savour it slowly.
While drinking, I discover H has never read any Frog and Toad books. Despite shivering slightly in the cold, I commence a dramatic reading of the cookie story. Toad has baked some cookies and shares them with Frog, but they cannot stop eating. H is staring right into my eyes as I look up from my phone, emphasising just how much willpower the amphibian friends really do not have.
~
There’s an easiness to picture books and emotions, at least from the reader’s perspective.
On a difficult day at the end of April, H bemoans that it is the mouse who sank the boat. At first, I understand the metaphor but can’t think why he chooses this over a camel. H is surprised that I don’t understand. I haven’t thought of Pamela Allen’s books in quite some time, despite stocking them at work, and I recall with surprise her soft characters, always outlined by a striking use of the page’s white. After contemplating H’s gloominess, I feel attracted to discussing emotions in relation to picture books. Sometimes the world is overwhelming, like going on a bear hunt; sometimes I am a wombat who wishes to sleep.
I’ve maintained for some time that We’re Going on a Bear Hunt is a story about anxiety and preconceptions, as the siblings hardly see the bear before they start running for home. Perhaps the bear is just a little lonely, not so big and scary. The day before we’re due to have our Covid vaccinations together, H starts to chant: ‘We’re going to get vaccinated. We’re going to get vaccinated.’
‘I’m not scared. I’m not scared,’ I call back.
~
Love, to me, has something to do with mixing primary colours into fireworks, turning pages, laughing, repeating stories while tucked under a blanket, fairy lights still on; of remembering everything before, just as much as yearning for everything that will come. I think I’d like to grow down, not up.
I think I am searching for a library of love. ▼
Image: Pranathi Chinaluri
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