Big Friendly Vegan

[This one was, I think, my first piece for Ed's site. It was done in 2001.]

When our daughter was born, it was inevitable that we would receive gifts for the baby. These ranged from the practical to the playful and all were greatly appreciated. One of my friends, knowing how I loved to read and would also read to my daughter (in fact I started reading The Hobbit to the baby when she was two hours old) gave her some books, one of which was an ABC book. I know that this isn't strange at all, but when I looked at the front cover of the book I saw that in addition to an illustrator there was also an author!

Now, I can appreciate the skill that goes into the visual design of a children's book and live in awe of the skill that illustrators have. Likewise, the ability to write entertaining poetry and prose for the little ones is a wonderful gift to have. I just didn't understand how a book about the letters of the alphabet could have an author. I opened the book and found that, rather than just a collection of letters, this book actually had little stories associated with the letter (hence the author) and the pictures illustrated the story as well as the letter.

This particular book had an animal and plant theme with native flora and fauna beginning with each letter. I found the book totally fascinating and quite satisfying, up to a point.

Now, you're probably thinking that I am a little mad, or have led a very sheltered life in order to get interested in a simple ABC book. This is probably true, but what I did next is even stranger and serves to confirm whatever impression you undoubtedly have formed.

You see, as I was reading through the book (and brushing up on my native plants and animals) I came, invariably to X. Now, there aren't too many surprises in an ABC book; B follows A, G leads H, and Z always finishes last. So, while the book lacked any real suspense or drama, it did have some tragedy. At X, the author had used "X-Mas Beetle" as the animal.

Now I realize that this isn't as appalling as say seeing Bambi's mother dying (a tragedy that still brings me to tears), but as a reasonably well-read person, I was deeply offended. How dare they take a perfectly good alphabet and a great premise and wreck it with "Xmas"! No one actually says the X in Xmas (well, not that I know of anyway), so why would you use that to teach a child his or her ABC's?

This discovery doesn't sound too strange, I agree, but I'm getting to that part. After being disappointed by this betrayal (which I liken to reading a really good novel and then finding out, after 600 pages, that it was all a dream in the first place) I decided to have a look at other ABC books to see how they handled X.

You may be asking yourself "Why would a fully grown and obviously intelligent man go to a book store and look at ABC books (shelved by author, of course)"? The answer is simple; I want value for my X. I realize that I didn't pay for this particular book, but if I did want to buy one (to teach my daughter about the joys of X, maybe) then I would want to make sure that all of the letters are set firmly into there correct places and that all was right with the world in general. After all, once you start messing about with the alphabet, the next step is spelling, and then grammar, and then what? You end up buying "Lite" products, and you can't spell potato anymore.

Anyway, it was off to the local bookstore for some research into X. Fortunately, there was quite a collection to examine; it seems that everyone who's anyone turns his or her hand to these things. Now I wish to point out, before I present the results of my findings, that I am not here to comment on the illustrators of these tomes, who by and large do a very nice job. It may seem outrageous to spend $30+ dollars on an alphabet book, but when you compare the illustrations in these to the $1.95 bargain basket books, you can see that you aren't paying for the writing (at least, I hope you're not). Anyway, back to the results. It seems that, for perhaps obvious reasons, xylophone was a very popular X choice. This is fine if the book is a general "things that begin with certain letters" type book, but it does tend to limit the themed volumes to books about musical instruments. There were occasional X-Rays, both in the general type books and in science or medicine themed ones, and even the occasional X-mas reared its head (I still can't justify this one), but that was it, and I think I know why.

Take a break for a second and try to think of as many words as you can that begin with X (ignoring X-mas, X-ray, and xylophone, because I've already used them; and no, X-Files doesn't count, either). Write them down. Now count how many you have.

Is the total 0?

Here we have an excellent example of a self-fulfilling prophecy. We can't think of X words because all we have been taught from our ABC books is xylophone, which in turn leads us to only teach that to our children, which results in them not knowing any X words. The disturbing thing is that no one cares! As the English language evolved, there were probably lots and lots of X words invented. These words, however, died over the generations because all anyone was ever taught about X was that you use it to spell "xylophone". This is why it's got such a high value in Scrabble. The supply is restricted and the value of the letter increases. I don't know about the rest of you, but I am not going to let this happen. I am going to reclaim our heritage.

Right now I am in the process of writing some themed ABC books that will, I hope, inspire a resurgence in the letter X. I am so dedicated to this project that my wife and I plan to name our first son Xavier.

Imagine a world where X not only marks the spot or indicates a wrong answer, but where it is loved and cherished as much as A, B and even W. Let's take it out of the hands of mathematicians and physicists, who have abused it for so long, and give it back to the poets. I strongly urge you to support this cause and buy the following products: The Greek Mythology Alphabet, where you can read about Argonauts, Minotaurs and Xerxes; The KKK Alphabet, where you will see Bigots, Shotguns, and Xenophobes, (but not Malcolm X); and finally the Insect Classification Alphabet, where you will find Arachnid, Chaetopod, and Xylophage.

They will be available in all the more enlightened bookstores, just as soon as I get an illustrator, a publisher and a distributor. I am happy to put my X next to any offer.