Wolfenoot

Back in September of 2019, my little human was a lot littler, only 7 years old, but no less prone to flights of fancy than he is now. One day he told me about a holiday he had made up called Wolfenoot. I believe it may have been inspired by a Roblox game he was playing at the time called “Wolf Life Simulator” or something similar. He was also probably processing some new information that had come to light regarding a certain red fur clad gentleman who may or may not be, in the strictest sense, “real”.

In any case, he informed me that Wolfenoot was when the Spirit of the Wolf visited homes where the humans were kind to dogs, and animals in general, and left them little presents. He said we should eat roast meat, because wolves eat meat, and have a chocolate cake that looks like the moon. Wolves do not eat chocolate cake, as a rule, but seven year old boys often do, so perhaps we can forgive him his youthful inconsistencies.

I said, “Okay, sure, let’s do it.” And then I did what any Momma enamoured with her baby’s imagination would do and posted about it on the Book of Face. It was, I thought, a very average “look at this cute thing my kid came up with” post. It was not the first I had done. But then a friend of mine in the US asked if I’d make it public so he could show his friends, and… well. I went on a four hour road trip and by the time I came back it had exploded.

I was accused of making it up. “No child would say that,” said people who clearly don’t spend a lot of time around children (or at least don’t listen when they talk). People complained that is was too close to Thanksgiving (We don’t live in the USA). People complained that it made no sense to eat meat if you were supposed to be being nice to animals (He was 7, please forgive him for maybe not being entirely logically consistent, no one is forcing you to eat meat). It was exhilarating, and terrifying all at once. Eventually, I realised that no matter what you do someone is going to complain. I got myself a team of moderators to help me manage the flood of stuff.

We did charity auctions, we made a book. GRR Martin sent the kid a signed first edition of his children’s book, which was bonkers and cool. I hid my child’s name from the internet so he wouldn’t have to deal with being “The Wolfenoot Kid” forever unless he chose to own it later. It got very intense for a while.

Nowdays, people still buy the book on occasion, though my stock is running low, and I’ll probably not reprint again at this stage. People still discover it, get excited, message me. People still celebrate. But we’ve kind of chilled about it. It’s still around, and people still do cool things in its name. Most importantly I hear from parents telling me that their kids have been inspired by the fact that a kid made it up. That makes me happy.