On July 31, 1944, Antoine de St. Exupéry’s plane was over the Mediterranean as he headed home from a reconnaissance mission. One year earlier he published “The Little Prince,” a beautiful and fantastical book which appears to be for children but speaks deeply to the adult heart tired of adult concerns.

In the first passage, he tells the story of his drawing Number One.

“Once when I was six I saw a magnificent picture in a book about the jungle, called True Stories. It showed a boa constrictor swallowing a wild beast [...] In those days I thought a lot about jungle adventures, and eventually managed to make my first drawing, using a colored pencil. My drawing Number One looked like this:

I showed the grown-ups my masterpiece, and I asked them if my drawing scared them. They answered, ‘Why be scared of a hat?’”

Drawing Number One

How quickly we try to identify and categorize things, slotting them into our understanding of the world.

St. Exupéry continues, “My drawing was not a picture of a hat. It was a picture of a boa constrictor digesting an elephant.”

Drawing Number Two

Children do not have that condition, they think with recklessness and infinite possibilty. Adults are not encouraged to think this way so we leave that to the children and geniuses (who have somehow figured out how to be adults, imaginative, and revered.)

The goal in this jam is to rekindle the fantastical in our lives; to return to our child-like creativity and make new media experiences; to go beyond the transmedia mash-ups where we find understanding and comfort; to make more than just hats.