Bad Hare Day

So this month we’re focusing on inspiration. We’ve even been given a nice sentence to help illustrate the theme.

“I was just____ and it hit me____!”

 “I was just in a rabbit costume, and it hit me…heat stroke!”

 The sentence might sound crazy, but… Fifteen years ago I agreed to dress as a white rabbit for an Easter parade in a local neighborhood. Little did I know I’d be walking two and a half miles in oversized bunny feet, covered in thick wool fur and suffocating in a ten pound plastic head that smelled like car tires and sweat.

Did I mention it was over 90 outside and I worked for four hours without a break?

So, yes, heat stroke was imminent, but the least of my problems.

I was attacked by a seven year old Mike Tyson impersonator who thought it’d be funny to punch Peter Cottontail in the stomach. Children yanked my tail, poked my mesh eyes, pulled my ears and one even tripped me.

I also held screaming babies and fidgeting toddlers on my lap while I waved to a photographer who moved slower than a turtle with arthritis.

After hours in the costume, a jab in the gut, no water and the odd stink of deodorant, rubber and BO swirling around in the mask I’d had enough.

I fainted.

In front of everyone.

Of course to a child, a six foot rabbit losing consciousness looks exactly like a six foot rabbit dying. I was told later (after being placed on a gurney…headless but still in costume, loaded in the ambulance, and rushed to the hospital) that most every kid at the festival under 6 years old was sure the Easter Bunny had died of a heart attack and then was quickly beheaded.

How’d you like to explain that one to your toddler?

I’m thinking there’s not enough Cadburry Eggs in the world to help them forget that horrifying image.

Anyway, though I wouldn’t volunteer to be a holiday mascot ever again, the experience wasn’t all bad.

In fact, it became my inspiration for my contemporary novel, Blessing in Disguise.

My heroine wears a costume at a holiday parade, suffers from heatstroke and faints right into the arms of the hero.

Right now the story is under publisher consideration. I’m crossing my fingers!

So the moral of this totally true tale is – inspiration can come from just about anywhere. You just have to know where to look.  

Keep dreaming, keep writing, keep submitting!

Have a great day,

Tamara DeStefano