Dear Mr. Watterson

A comic strip, to me is a

story. It could be a brief story.

It's like having the opportunity

to get a peek into people,

characters, lives.

And they can make you laugh,

they can make you cry,

just have an impact on you.

For that time that you read it,

it's a world unto itself.

My mom was always

trying to get me to read.

And I wasn't really into books

with words, so to speak.

My dad brought home a couple

of Calvin and Hobbes books.

And he showed me some

comic strips of Calvin and Hobbes.

And I was like, whoa.

- And I can remember

opening it up.

I turn the page and --

Hobbes wanted me to have this,

and from that point on,

it's been me, Calvin, and Hobbes.

I met Calvin and Hobbes

in the paper, I think,

the way most people did.

Looking through the comics

and Calvin and Hobbes was

always one that stood out.

My grandmother is a huge fan

of Calvin and Hobbes.

My first and only crime,

I shoplifted this book.

- And I found this book of

Complete Calvin and Hobbes.

It was in English,

but I said, I don't care.

I'm going to learn this language

just to understand this book.

I was babysitting, and a couple

of the kids that I babysat,

they had some books.

All the books got passed to me,

and ended up in my room for a while,

and we would be trading them

back and forth.

I hadn't seen a strip before,

but I saw the book in a bookstore.

And it was on sale.

It was like $3

or something like that.

So I was like, alright,

I'll look at it.

Fold it open, and the first thing

I saw was the snowmen.

And I burst out laughing

and proceeded to get trouble

in English class.

I remember just reading that thing

over and over and over.

Even now, as I re-read them

and I continue to re-read them,

I discover so many layers now.

And it's never boring or old.

It's just like a living thing,

and I just discover it

and appreciate it more.

Calvin is like the kid

you want to be, you know.

Even if you're a 300-pound

black kid, I mean,

you still want to be Calvin.

- I did want to be Calvin.

I felt like I was Calvin.

We were both six years old

in 1985.

We liked tigers, space,

playing in the snow,

had fathers who loved

building character.

And I took pride in the fact

that my first hairstyle

was quite Calvin-esque.

But the truth is that I don't

really remember

when I first met Calvin and Hobbes.

I'd like to think I was

a reader from day one,

but I know that isn't possible.

My hometown newspaper didn't

even start carrying the strip

until spring of 1988.

The earliest memory that

I can stamp with a date

would be third grade

in Mrs. Smith's classroom,

when I saw a Calvin and Hobbes

collection

in the Scholastic book catalog.

But if I examine my books,

I find that the only one

with a Scholastic logo is

Scientific Progress Goes Boink,

with a copyright of 1991.

If I didn't discover Calvin and Hobbes

until that late in life,

I'm secretly embarrassed.

And I would also blame my parents.

That little boy seemed

kind of naughty,

and I didn't know if I wanted

my son interested

in a naughty comic character.

- Apparently, no thanks to my mom,

Calvin and Hobbes were

just always there.

And I don't really remember

life without them.

I may have fallen in love

with Calvin and Hobbes as a kid,

but it's one of those rare things

that still holds great significance

to me as an adult.

I really can't think of anything else

from my childhood that has retained

so much value.

I don't claim to be an expert

on comics.

I'm not even close.

I never read comic books.

I haven't read the newspaper

comics regularly for years.

And I've only recently started

to reacquaint myself

with what the comics

have to offer now.

But for years I've read and re-read

my Calvin and Hobbes books,

which always put a smile on my face.

And the strip still holds meaning

for so many other readers

around the world.

I know, because I've heard from them,

and they've sent me their stories.

Many people have tried to track down

Bill Watterson over the years.

But I'm not so interested

in the man himself,

but why his simple comic strip

about a boy and his tiger

could somehow have such meaning

and have had such a personal impact

on so many people.

Just as people often find it

a challenge

to describe the strip itself,

I think anybody would have

a hard time distilling the ingredients

that made it what it is.

But we can be sure of one thing:

On November 18, 1985,

Bill Watterson's creation debuted

in just a few dozen newspapers,

and it left an enormous imprint

on countless readers

from across the globe.

The very first Calvin

and Hobbes strip,

Calvin is off to check his tiger trap

that he rigged up

with a tuna fish sandwich,

and sure enough,

in the last frame we see that Hobbes

has fallen for the bait,

and he has his very own tiger friend

for life.

And that is our intro

to Calvin and Hobbes.

I've never met anyone who

doesn't like Calvin and Hobbes,

so I can't say that

about any other strip.

And there are other strips that are

very, very popular, very successful,

most people love them,

but invariably I'll run into someone

that says I just don't get that strip,

or I really don't like that strip.

With Calvin and Hobbes,

it's different.

It just seems to appeal

to all different audiences:

young and old

and men and women

and people in the country,

people in the city.

I mean, really, just all demographics,

it seems to speak to people.

Everyone is united

by their love for this strip,

but everyone has a specific thing

that they love about it

or specific things

that they love about it,

and it's not always the same thing.

I grew up in a

Mexican neighborhood.

I went to a white school,

and I was like 300 pounds.

So I didn't really fit in,

but neither did Calvin.

And it wasn't really a problem.

He was just, I'm weird,

and this is the way I am,

and this is who I'm going to be.

And I think that's one of the things

that really kind of attracted me

to the character.

What really resonated to me was

the whole imagination aspect of it,

and how he just created it

in his head.

And he didn't even see his teacher

or his principal,

he just saw aliens,

and he was Spaceman Spiff.

- It's a very deep,

very philosophical experience

reading a Calvin and Hobbes book.

Even though on the surface

they're just cartoons.

- He's really created characters

that I think have a lot of depth

and are interesting to read about.

Calvin and Hobbes is

such a subversive comic.

But it has a purity to it

that most comics don't,

because it is so joyful and very much

in the imagination of this kid.

And yet he is hyper-aware

of world events and pop culture

and ironies and social concepts.

And I just found that

really, really exciting.

My mom died about 11 years ago

of a heart attack.

And my husband is a huge fan

of Calvin and Hobbes, so he had

a lot of the paperback collections

laying around the house.

And I would just sit at night

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