Beware the Jocko Meenies
“Beware the Jocko Meenies”
A make-believe bedtime story about imaginary creatures becomes real when a little girl catches a glimpse of one in her back yard. Or does she?
“Beware the Jocko Meenies” is a children’s picture book that takes the reader into the mind of a small child who believes that the creatures that her Father creates in his evening bedtime story are real.
Who are these creatures and what do they want? Well, for one thing, they like to eat bushes. Yessir, every night they chew and chew and chew. When morning comes, the little girl looks out into her yard and more and more bushes have been chewed–they even eat the roses! Jocko Meenies MUST be real, mustn’t they?
She decides to catch a Jocko Meenie but it’s not an easy task. You see, they only appear at night when she’s asleep. She makes elaborate plans to catch one but her plans go awry for a very simple reason–she just cannot stay awake! That is, until one windy night when a storm blows in and wakes her up from a deep sleep. She silently creeps to her bedroom window. A flash of lightening illuminates the sky for just a second. Is that a Jocko Meenie in the yard? She looks again trying to see this animal, this thing called a Jocko Meenie, but whatever that creature was, it is gone. Was this the strange critter that her Father has told her about? Are there more Jocko Meenies hiding in the dark? Or is what she saw just some wild animal like a raccoon or a deer?
We may never know, but one thing’s for sure. In this child’s world, the world that her father has created, Jocko Meenies are for real. At least, she thinks they are.