Introduction I worked at my son's preschool today. It's a co-op so I spend a day there at least once a month. I sort of dread doing it, yet when it happens it's not so bad. The snack comes midway through the morning and that is the highlight for me. Today, there were strange red rice crackers, hot dogs, and sad green grapes. I had been so excited and then I was so disappointed. Not that much happens during a morning at preschool, yet at the same time, of course, everything happens. Today, someone noticed a stink beetle on the ground and everyone gathered around. A girl drew on someone else's painting. One boy threw a tiny rake that nearly took out a teacher's eye. Early in my first moments there, I witnessed one boy tell another boy that the reason he wasn't invited to a party was that no one likes him. The boy no one likes took it much better than I would have. Later, after the dreadful snack, some kids were at an arts and crafts table beading pieces of colored wire. These turned out to be necklaces, albeit necklaces that hung funny. One girl was having the time of her life beading her wire. Then, seconds later, she was outside, weeping. She wept until the end of preschool. She was truly inconsolable. I never found out why. Another boy at the arts and crafts table was insistent that he needed foamy beads. I tried to find some for him, but I couldn't. So I simply walked away, hoping he had forgotten about the foamy beads. He hadn't. Fifteen minutes later, I saw a teacher telling him that they didn't have any foamy beads -- in fact, they had never had foamy beads. He calmly insisted that he needed foamy beads. I found that admirable. Anyway, now here I am, and it is night and it all seems so long ago. What should I say about the cartoons in this collection? In looking back at them I see that the vast majority are about relationships. God, "relationships" is such a terrible word. It makes relationships sound so dreary, not fun at all. "Fun" is a good word. "Relationships" -- terrible word. And most of the relationships in this book are romantic or sexual or unromantic and unsexual but would be romantic and sexual if people were in a better mood. Or if they were not tired because of work. Or because of life. But also there are cartoons about other kinds of relationships, such as those one has with parents, or friends, or neighbors, or enemies, or food, or whatever. I think my first real relationship was with my wallpaper. I mean it. I remember reaching through my crib and touching it. It was yellow and reassuringly bumpy. Somehow it soothed me. Even writing about it now, four decades later, makes me feel better, as I have been feeling a little anxious all day -- which is actually how I spend every day. Another early important relationship I had was with a little enclosed space under a shelf in our den. I used to crawl in there and sit with some little objects (I can't remember what they were exactly, so I guess I didn't have that vivid a relationship with them) and say I was working in the Underbakery. The Underbakery was next to the radiator in the room and it was cozy and I remember I would feel very safe and secure when I was in the Underbakery. The den had an object in the center of it that I had an extremely intense relationship with -- the television. I still do. The television was a real lifeline for me. It nourished me. It showed me so much about what life was and could or should be. I laughed, I cried, I was confused, I felt understood when I watched television. It's strange -- it suddenly strikes me that it hasn't occurred to me to mention my mother, or my father. They were there too during my childhood. I am just not sure what they were doing. An early romantic relationship for me was with Diane Kolankowski, who I met in elementary school. She had such great hair, which I think is the most important thing about people, but maybe that is just because I am bald. Diane Kolankowski, Diane Kolankowski -- I remember her second-grade party as if it were yesterday. That party was something. I remember it so clearly. More than I remember her, which says a lot. But back to the cartoons. Perhaps the most interesting relationship depicted in them is one's relationship with oneself. No matter where you go, you're always stuck with you, you can't get rid of you, and believe me, I've tried. To get rid of me, not you I mean. (You are fine, I guess.) All of this talk puts me in mind of a theory I once heard that has always stayed with me. It's that everything we do, we do for one of three reasons: because we love someone, because we hate someone, or because we're hungry. Think about it. It's really true. (Oh, I probably don't need to tell you this, but when I say we're hungry, I don't just mean we want food, although most of the time we do just want food. I mean, we have a need or an emptiness or a sadness. Like that boy at preschool today, we just want the foamy beads. Even if they don't exist and never have.) In any case, here are the cartoons. I hope they have some meaning for you, whoever you are. If by any chance they do, I know why -- you either love someone, you hate someone, or you're hungry. Trust me, it's one of those three things. Bruce Eric Kaplan Los Angeles, California Excerpted from I Love You, I Hate You, I'm Hungry: A Collection of Cartoons by Bruce Eric Kaplan All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
