Bootime: What Was I Scared? of by Dr. Seuss

WELL, I WAS WALKING IN THE NIGHT,
AND I SAW NOTHING SCARY.
FOR I HAVE NEVER BEEN AFRAID
OF ANYTHING. NOT VERY.

THEN I WAS DEEP IN THE WOODS,
WHEN, SUDDENLY, I SPIED THEM.
I SAW A PAIR OF PALE GREEN PANTS
WITH NOBODY INSIDE THEM.

And with that recognizable rhythm-and-rhyme scheme, we know we're off and running with one of the legendary Seuss stories, this one a rare, spooky tale for the scary season.

Who wouldn't be afraid of a pair of ordinary pants, filled with nothing but ghostly spiritude. self-animated, greenish pants that appear seemingly everywhere our little Seuss guy goes. The pants run into him around a corner in town, join him in his fishing boat, and practically scare the pants off him at every turn. Now, who's the scaredy pants?

There's only one thing to do, and that is to face down the fear, also known as whistling in the graveyard, and Dr. Seuss has a revelation for these scaredy pants!

AND IN THAT DREADFUL PLACE
THOSE SPOOKY EMPTY PANTS AND I
WERE STANDING FACE TO FACE!

I NEVER HEARD SUCH WHIMPERING
AND I BEGAN TO SEE
THAT I WAS JUST AS STRANGE TO THEM
AS THEY WERE STRANGE TO ME.

A scary Dr. Seuss tale is a fun tale for the upcoming scary season, and after the tale is read, switch off the lamp and enjoy paging through the book again for the fun of the "glow-in-the-dark encounter" provided in this timely edition of Theodore Seuss Geisel's What Was I Scared Of?: A Glow-in-the Dark Encounter (Classic Seuss) (Random House). A good scary story never grows old, and neither, it seems, does Dr. Seuss.