We're STILL "Free To Be You And Me"

As I grumpily scrolled through my Reader today, looking for some idiot thing that some moronic celebrity did, or some freakshow human interest story that was worth my vitriol and ridicule, something rather amazing happened. I read that Marlo Thomas's 1973 book Free To Be...You and Me was not only celebrating its 35th anniversary, but was being re-issued with new material and songs.

And lo, Miss Banshee's snarky heart grew three sizes that day.

Free To Be..., which has the simple message that you are awesome just the way you are, was, according to Marlo Thomas, totally ahead of its time back when it was first published in 1973, but the universal message of acceptance and celebration of our similarities and differences is just as important now that the original readers of the book can read it to their own kids.

"The message is a rather deep one, that you can choose your own role models, you can fight stereotypes," says Thomas, 70, who starred in the hit '60s TV series That Girl, which broke single-woman-in-the-city stereotypes. Free to Be "was a revolutionary book. Some people were even afraid of it."

People being afraid of a book that encourages children to embrace diversity? Thank goodness we've come so far in 35 years! (Listen, I said my heart GREW, I didn't say the snark moved OUT.) But coming off the tail end of Banned Books Week, the list of which has LOADS of current children's books on it, we NEED this sweet little book more than ever.

The new edition has all the original material from authors such as Shel Silverstein and Judy Blume, and has fourteen new contributions, updated artwork, and a new accompanying CD to go along with the original songs. Hopefully the new material will be incorporated into the live shows based on the book, which have been performed for decades. 

In the time of Heather Has Two Mommies being pulled off the shelves, girls still being told not to play with trucks and boys never to cuddle a doll,  maybe we all need to go back to our roots and remind ourselves of what the purpose of Free To Be... was 35 years ago, and still is today. That we're all different, we're all unique, and that's just spectacular.

Thomas recalls what Kurt Vonnegut wrote in the original afterword of Free To Be...

"That it's a manual for what's possible," says Thomas. "I like to think that is what this book is."

That's damn right. And I don't care if I've lost all my street cred for this one. I just want to go find a kid and tell her she's perfect just the way she is.

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