Loulou And Tabboush…Those Eternal Heroes

I wonder If they are still there.

Trying to uncover life's mystery. Busy solving those small problems they treated as fierce clashes with fate. There, where Samia Is swaying in front of Tabboush trying to steal his heart. Breaking Loulou's heart on her way.

There, where Loulou's best friend, Hind, is doing her best to make her stubborn, feminist, passionate tornado-of-a-friend realize that Tabboush will never be hers.

But no.

Loulou does not care what the others say. He is her love. Tabboush is The one. That chubby little boy who could happily eat his life away, and who, most of the times yields under Samia's feminine schemes and artifice....That boy belongs to her.

There, where life is generous enough to allow them daily adventures. Glorious, colorful, happy adventures.

Loulou and her friends.

Those extended family members I grew up with. I wonder if they are still there. Living in that make-belief world Marjorie Hendersen Buell created in 1935, not knowing, perhaps, that she is going to change people's lives.

At least, "Marge" changed mine.

I remained Loulou for a long time. And I fought for my real versions of Tabboush as determinedly as Loulou did. I tried to belong to my male friends inner circles not caring that i was considered an intruder, and I did it as self-righteously as beautiful Loulou with her black curls, and her determination to be part of the boys' club .

Her ability to stand next to the weak. To be as sassy as she dared.With no care in this world except to live a life fit for fighters. That was the meaning of Loulou for me. Inside the very thin pages of each issue, I virtually dived on a weekly basis, and with each new adventure, to an already created world. And it was a world filled with magical simplicity.

I was able to be Loulou. A heroine whose courage lied in her ability to be different. Even in the way she looked. The way she dealt with her surroundings as though she were a leader by birth...The way my brother Fady would refuse to eat his meals without reading "Loulou as sagheera wa sadeekeeha Tabboush"...One hand for the food, the other for flipping the pages...The way I would wait religiously for the golden coin mum would give me if i behaved or got over Zero in Maths... The way i would fly to the small, intimate bookstore located on the ground floor of our building in Beirut and hungrily and as swiftly as possible buy my copy before it ran out.

When "Marge" created the comic strip character "Lulu moppet", (whose nickname eventually became Little Lulu); for The Saturday Evening Post, On the 23rd of February 1935, she made her a silent character.

In her debut, Loulou appeared as a flower girl swaying at a wedding (the way Samia would, much later in front of the boys-and on a daily basis); and throwing banana peels on the aisle.

For me, Loulou was nothing less than an outspoken unusually attractive little girl who made mischief look like elegance reincarnated. My Loulou couldn't be silent. She couldn't be demure. There were too many beautiful words to use and far too many adventures to live.

I so badly want them to remain there.

where each story is blissfully plotted. Each character knows his line, and there is no sad ending. Not even when Tabboush decides to runaway from home, or when Samia manages to snag both Tabboush and the rich and arrogant "Barbar" from My Loulou...who is secretely me!

There, where my dad once became responsible manager for the magazine...and i instantly became a heroine midst my entourage.

I don't know if they remained there. Those dear, extended family members who made life so a roller-coaster adventure filled with innocence, back then.

But I know I have.