I was a shy child…

As a girl, I was very shy. It was difficult for me to fit in with large groups of children, as I felt self-conscious and awkward. Making it even harder for me was that we moved often in my formative years as my father was a Navy man. This meant I lost touch with the friends I had made, while having to start over to find new friends.

Believing that my shyness was a personal weakness, I worked hard to overcome it. I remember feeling I had critical self who was sitting on my shoulder and making judgments about each action I took, each sentence I uttered. I would literally wither under that judgment and become tongue-tied.

Eventually, I learned to focus on another person, asking questions about her life, and letting her talk to me. It worked! We would find common interests and shared experiences, which created the basis for new friendships. By focusing on making someone else comfortable, I was able to feel comfortable as well.

In my twenties, my mother suggested another trick: that I find a group centered around something I liked to do. Initially of course, I didn’t want to believe her, but I did try it and it worked.  Being part of a small group of like-minded people really helped me in those single years. Whether it was a hiking group like the Adirondack Club or getting to know the parents of my children’s friends, I found kinship in those situations that led to some long-lasting friendships.

In my children’s book, The Friendship Tales: Lili Bunny’s Quest, I introduced the concept of a friendship that grows from shared interests. Lili saw Daffy swaying in the breeze and asked if they could be friends because they both loved to dance. While Daffy initially said no because she was scared of rabbits who had been destructive to her cousins, she eventually saw that Lili was kind (Lili carefully set the dead daffodils along the bank out of the way of the big rabbits) and that she liked to dance in the breeze just as Daffy did. Lili and Desi became friends because they liked running and jumping, they sang the same songs and enjoyed the same stories. Lili forgot her “quest to find a friend” and focused instead on shared interests. This led her to find not one, but two friends.

As I have aged, I have realized that people have different types of friendships. Some people love being part of a big group and thrive on being the center of attention. I prefer having one-to-one conversations or small group interactions. I have grown to accept that I don’t love a crowd, and that this is perfectly okay. Now when I find myself in a room full of people, I try to pick one or two individuals to talk with rather than trying to be part of the big dynamic.  And I would rather have a small, sit-down dinner party than a big cocktail party. I have learned that my innate shyness isn’t a failing, but rather a manner of being, and I have grown comfortable with this.

A Rabbit’s Death

Two nights ago, my Beagle, Banjo, and his sidekick, Zoey, flushed a young rabbit out of our shrubbery. Sadly, Banjo caught it from behind. He appeared at our door with a live juvenile bunny hanging out of his mouth. He was desperate to come inside and give us his present. It took two of us to pry Banjo’s jaws open and release the rabbit. The bunny was in shock with a broken hind leg and probably internal damage. It died shortly afterwards on our back porch.

This young rabbit was peaceful in its last minutes of life, but I couldn’t stop thinking about its death overnight and into the next day. She was about the age of my bunny characters, Lili and Desi. She, like so many young rabbits, was taken before adulthood by predators. But perhaps in the grand scheme of things, she lived fully as she darted along our property line, hiding in the ivy groundcover, nibbling on our grass, and giving the dogs exercise when they caught sight of her. 

This juvenile could have been eaten by one of the coyotes that frequent our neighborhood. She could have fallen prey to the three ospreys that circle above us daily. Instead, she was caught by domestic pets, which makes me feel sad that her life didn’t fit neatly into the order of things.

Maybe it is our human perspective that mourns the loss of animals and not the perspective of the animals themselves. They obviously feel pain and can be easily hurt when caught. Thankfully they go into shock quickly and seem to give themselves to death more easily than we do. But the short arc of their lives is part of their story, not ours. It is their life lived fully to the end.

If there is a lesson for me in all this, I think it might be to live as aware as possible in each moment of life, even when it involves loss. I will mourn that little rabbit for a time, forgive the dogs for doing what comes instinctively to them, and then I will re-discover wonder in the arc of my own story.

Monkey Bars

Watercolor by Lisa Goddard from 1963

From childhood on, I’ve kept written journals as well as notebooks filled with pen and ink drawings. My early sketches involved copying such book illustrations as A Friend is Someone who Likes You, and Cowboy and His Friend by Joan Walsh Anglund. Now, in my eighth decade I am returning to pen and ink illustrations as I begin this new pursuit—writing and illustrating children’s books.

My inspiration for stories comes from recollections of my own life. In my first book, Lili Bunny’s Quest, I have drawn upon my kindergarten year at a school in Washington, DC. I was a shy little girl and during recess I took refuge on the monkey bars. How I loved to swing hand-over-hand! It was through this activity school, swinging, climbing across and dropping from those monkey bars, and I remember Desi coming to our house to swim in our pool. I haven’t seen Desi since those years, but his friendship still feels so fresh.

It makes sense when looking for a friend to look for something to do that you love. Whether it’s hiking, or swimming, or swinging on the monkey bars, if you join a group that enjoys what you do, you are likely to find a friend.

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Welcome to…

Welcome to Lisa Goddard Books, my newest endeavor after a lifetime of making art!

I take great pleasure in sharing my own childhood experiences through children’s books to kindle the simple joys of friendship and kindness in the young and young-at-heart.

With the release of “The Friendship Tales: Lili Bunny’s Quest,” I have launched a planned quartet of stories involving young rabbits and their eye-opening adventures. I am working on the second tale in this series to be launched in 2027