oh the places we'll go...

Reading the local Saturday paper late Saturday night I stumbled upon the uber-exciting news that there was a four day exhibition in Newcastle - The Art of Dr Seuss.

Now, I've already written on my love for this genius of a man, and this adoration has been passed onto my daughter - who uses the great man for inspiration in her writing and drawing.

So, after clearing next weekend's calendar I read the fine print and found that the exhibition opened on Thursday, and was closing 5pm Sunday - as in yesterday. A quick re-arrangement of plans was in order.

So at 9.45am, after a fortifying bowl of coffee each {not for the nine-year-old...} we all strolled into the Town Hall and were dazzled and amazed by the exhibition. Great big works of easily-identifiable art adorned every surface, along with his early advertising work, mis-understood works for grown-ups and a work-in-progress for The Cat in the Hat that showed how Dr Seuss worked on every stage of the process - words, illustrations, colours, layout and typography.

Genius.

It was utterly fascinating and we were all thrilled that we attended.

I still think his final book is his most inspiring. I bumped into a friend at the exhibition who told me that she gives her graduating Year 12 students a copy of The Places You'll Go - which is the best graduation present ever. No story can more effectively teach us about striving for what we want, acknowledging that there are bumps, upsets and backtracks along the way, but that ulitimately YOU have the power to just be YOU.

Maybe we should all start every week with a dose of the Dr.