Here's an optional Introduction to: An After Bedtime Story:
This story goes back some years – to a time when our son David was small. David is grown up now and bigger than either of us. But like you and me, he was once very small, and one day, or rather, one night, he had what I can only imagine was a very strange dream, maybe even a nightmare. He woke up and cried, as four-year-olds do, except this night he cried much more loudly than usual. We woke up, of course, and rushed to his bedroom.
“What’s the matter, David?” we both asked.
“A tiger bit me,” he answered.
I looked around the room. “I don’t see any tiger,” I said, “Where did it bite you?”
“Right here,” he said, showing me ... well, I’m not going to show you exactly where David claimed to have been bitten.
“I don’t see any tiger bites on you.”
“Well, it bit me just the same,” he said, and fell asleep again.
So maybe there really was a tiger and maybe there really were bite marks that healed so quickly we never saw them.
Some time later, we made up a little poem about this event.
This story goes back some years – to a time when our son David was small. David is grown up now and bigger than either of us. But like you and me, he was once very small, and one day, or rather, one night, he had what I can only imagine was a very strange dream, maybe even a nightmare. He woke up and cried, as four-year-olds do, except this night he cried much more loudly than usual. We woke up, of course, and rushed to his bedroom.
“What’s the matter, David?” we both asked.
“A tiger bit me,” he answered.
I looked around the room. “I don’t see any tiger,” I said, “Where did it bite you?”
“Right here,” he said, showing me ... well, I’m not going to show you exactly where David claimed to have been bitten.
“I don’t see any tiger bites on you.”
“Well, it bit me just the same,” he said, and fell asleep again.
So maybe there really was a tiger and maybe there really were bite marks that healed so quickly we never saw them.
Some time later, we made up a little poem about this event.