One of the presents I gave my three-year-old granddaughter for her sister’s birthday earlier this month was a copy of The Little Engine That Could. I happened upon a Little Golden Book edition that used the same illustrations as the copy I had when I was in preschool, which made me feel like I was giving her a small piece of my own childhood.
I wrote a few years ago about my mother reading The Little Engine That Could to me. I know this wasn’t the first book she read to me, but it’s one of the earliest books I remember. The story of the little blue engine who achieves great things because she thinks she can has stayed with me since childhood. I wanted to tell my granddaughter that my mommy read the book to me, just like her mommy and daddy read to her.
I was surprised—and a little disappointed—to learn my granddaughter already had a copy of the book. I was even more disappointed to discover that her mother doesn’t like the story. I’m not entirely sure why. Perhaps it’s the repetition, though my daughter said many of their children’s books contain endless repetition, as most children’s books do. Or perhaps she doesn’t like the emphasis on the “good little boys and girls” waiting on the other side of the mountain for their treats. That emphasis doesn’t comport with modern theories of parenting.
I loved the repetition when I heard the story as a child. I waited for each refrain of “I think I can, I think I can.” I waited for the moment when the children on the other side got their good food and toys as a result of the little blue engine’s success. And I loved the little blue engine’s self-confidence in her final words, “I thought I could, I thought I could.” The story taught me to believe that effort leads to reward, that persistence pays off, and that self-belief can help us climb mountains.
Maybe I leaned too fully into that childhood lesson, even in my adult life, rather than accepting the more complicated truth that trying and willpower do not always guarantee success.
In any case, I don’t know if the copy I gave my granddaughter will get much reading time in her home. Perhaps I will read it to her myself someday, as I intended.
But then again, maybe it doesn’t really matter. Because without any prompting, the moment she saw the book, my granddaughter recited how the little blue engine got everything over the mountain because she thought she could.
Maybe that is enough. Maybe that simple lesson is something each generation manages to absorb, even if the vehicle for learning the lesson differs over time. Perhaps every child needs to believe that even the smallest among us can achieve something difficult through determination and effort.
I know my granddaughter will learn life’s lessons differently than I did. But life has not changed so much that the same truths are no longer worth learning. The forms may shift, the books may vary, but the lessons stay. The continuity from one generation to the next is what I had hoped for when I gave her the book—not so much the story itself, but the thread connecting my mother to me, me to my daughter, and now to my granddaughter.
At some point in life, we all have to learn to believe in ourselves. We have to think we can. And then, somehow, we must do.
What life lessons do you hope to pass on to your children and grandchildren?
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I would like my 2 grandchildren to always look for the good in the world and, perhaps more importantly, create the good as much as they are able.