Dear Mr. Watterson

-A comic strip, to me, is a story

And a real brief story.

It's like having the opportunity

To get a peek into people, characters' lives.

And they can make you laugh. They can make you cry.

They just have an impact on you.

For the time that you read it, it's a world unto itself.

-My mom was always trying to get me to read,

And I wasn't really into books with "words," so to speak.

-My dad brought home a couple of "calvin and hobbes" books.

-And he showed me some comic strips of "calvin and hobbes,"

And I was like, "whoa!"

-And I can remember opening it up,

I turned the page, and hobbes wanted me to have this.

And from that point on, it was me, calvin, and hobbes.

-I met calvin and hobbes in the paper, I think, the way most people did.

Looking through the comics,

And "calvin and hobbes" was always one that stood out.

-My grandmother is a huge fan of "calvin and hobbes."

-My first and only crime -- I shoplifted this book.

-And I found this book of "complete calvin and hobbes."

It was in english, but I said, "I don't care.

I'm gonna learn this language just to understand this book."

I was babysitting,

And a couple of the kids that I babysat,

They had some books.

All the books got passed to me

And ended up in my room for awhile.

You know, we'd be trading them back and forth.

I hadn't seen the strip before,

But I saw the book in a bookstore.

-And it was on sale. It was like $3 or something like that.

So I was like, "all right. I'll look at it."

Pulled it open, and the first thing I saw was the snowmen.

And I burst out laughing

And proceeded to get in trouble in english class.

-I remember just reading that thing over and over and over.

-Even now, I reread them, and I continue to reread them.

I discover so many layers now, and it's never boring or old.

It's just like a living thing,

And I just discover it and appreciate it more.

-Calvin is like the kid you want to be, you know?

Even if you're a 300-pound black kid,

I mean, you still want to be calvin.

I di want to be calvin.

I felt like I was calvin.

We were both six years old in 1985.

We liked tigers, space, playing in the snow,

Had fathers who loved building character,

And I took pride in the fact

That my first hairstyle was quite calvin-esque.

But the truth is that I don't really remember

When I first met calvin and hobbes.

I'd like to think I was a reader from day one,

But I know that isn't possible.

My hometown newspaper didn't even start carrying the strip

Until spring of 1988.

The earliest memory that I can stamp with a date

Would be third grade in mrs. Smith's classroom,

When I saw a "calvin and hobbes" collection

In the scholastic book catalog.

But if I examine my books,

I find that the only one with a scholastic logo

Is "scientific progress goes 'boink,'"

With a copyright of 1991.

If I didn't discover "calvin and hobbes"

Until that late in life, I'm secretly embarrassed.

And I would also blame my parents.

-That little boy seemed kind of naughty,

And I didn't know

If I wanted my son interested in a naughty comic character.

-Apparently, no thanks to my mom,

Calvin and hobbes were just always there,

And I don't really remember life without them.

I may have fallen in love with "calvin and hobbes" as a kid,

But it's one of those rare things

That still holds great significance to me as an adult.

I really can't think of anything else from my childhood

That has retained so much value.

I don't claim to be an expert on comics --

I'm not even close.

I never read comic books,

I haven't read the newspaper comics regularly for years,

And I've only recently started to reacquaint myself

With what the comics have to offer now.

But for years, I read and reread my "calvin and hobbes" books,

Which always put a smile on my face.

And the strip still holds meaning

For so many other readers around the world.

I know because I've heard from them,

And they've sent me their stories.

Many people have tried to track down bill watterson

Over the years.

But I'm not so interested in the man himself

But why his simple comic strip about a boy and his tiger

Could somehow have such meaning

And have had such a personal impact on so many people.

Just as people often find it a challenge

To describe the strip itself,

I think anybody would have a hard time

Distilling the ingredients that made it what it is.

But we can be sure of one thing --

On November 18, 1985,

Bill watterson's creation debuted

In just a few dozen newspapers,

And it left an enormous imprint on countless readers

From across the globe.

-Well, the very first "calvin and hobbes" strip --

Calvin off to check his tiger trap

That he rigged up with a tuna fish sandwich,

And sure enough, in the last frame,

We see that hobbes has fallen for the bait,

And he has his very own tiger friend for life.

And that is our intro to "calvin and hobbes."

I've never met anyone

Who doesn't like "calvin and hobbes."

So, I can't say that about any other strip.

And there are other strips that are very, very popular,

Very successful.

Most people love them,

But, invariably, I'll run into someone that says,

"I just don't get that strip,"

Or, "I really don't like that strip."

With "calvin and hobbes," it's different.

It just seems to appeal to all different audiences --

Young and old and men and women

And people in the country, people in the city.

I mean, really, just all demographics.

It seems to speak to people.

-Everyone, you know, is united by their love for this strip,

But everyone has a specific thing that they love about it

Or specific things that they love about it.

And it's not always the same thing.

-Well, I grew up in a mexican neighborhood.

I went to a white school, and I was like 300 pounds,

So I didn't really fit in, but neither did calvin,

And, like, it wasn't really a problem.

He was just, "I'm weird, and that's the way I am,

And that's the way I'm gonna be."

And I think that's one of the things

That really kind of attracted me to the character.

What really resonated to me

Was the whole imagination aspect of it

And how he just created it in his head,

And he didn't even see his teacher or his principal.

He just saw saw aliens, and he was spaceman spiff.

-It's a very deep, very philosophical experience

Reading a "calvin and hobbes" book,

Even though, on the surface, they're just cartoons.

-He's really created characters that, I think,

Have a lot of depth and are interesting to read about.

-"calvin and hobbes" is such a subversive comic.

But it has a purity to it that most comics don't,

Because it is so joyful

And very much in the imagination of this kid,

And yet he is hyperaware of world events

And pop culture and ironies and social concepts,

And I just found that really, really exciting.

-My mom died about 11 years ago of a heart attack,

And my husband is a huge fan of "calvin and hobbes,"

So he had a lot of the paperback collections

Laying around the house,

And I would just sit at night and look through those.

And that's how I came to know "calvin and hobbes"

Is through those first three or four months after she passed.

It's just finding a place to laugh again.

-So I moved down here in this brand-new state,

This brand-new house, brand-new neighborhood, and I knew nobody.

So I was looking for something

To gravitate towards or associate with,

And "calvin and hobbes" became something I could bond with

On a daily basis when the newspaper would come.

I didn't understand, sometimes,

The significance of his statements,

But that really pushed me into research

And go to the dictionary or really looking for meaning.

It's one of those things that,

When you find it, you want to share it.

And as soon as he could start reading,

I wanted to give him the books.

And just like I thought it would --

I mean, there's times now

Where he'll be reading it in his bedroom,

And I'll just hear him laughing.

And just that simple act of hearing him laugh

As I know what he's reading, it's like, "there you go.

That's what I was hoping for."

-I don't know if you know how israel was in 2002, 2001.

It was pretty crazy.

You opened the newspaper,

And you saw another bombing every day.

It was really intense.

So I looked forward to the Sunday paper

Because they would run the strip,

And I'd cut them out and would hang them up on my wall.

Even if there was something horrible in the paper,

I would still get my smile and, you know, that good feeling

From just reading that.

It just relieves the stress of living in that kind of a world.

When we need something to smile about,