During our UNH days, Becky Turner once compared me to Rabbit from Winnie the Pooh. I have to admit there's some merit to the claim. The lapine member of the Thousand Acre Wood gang is smart (though not as smart as he thinks he is), a literate soul, and a devotee of order. His assessment of his own brainpower (which, it should be noted, dwarfs that of his pseudo-intellectual rival Owl) as well as his aversion to chaos, lead him to assume he is the logical choice for leadership whenever there is a task to be done. Usually, the other animals let him take charge, mainly because nobody else wants to do it.
While he can be overbearing and presumptuous, Rabbit is also fiercely loyal to those he loves, and cultivates a wide network of friends among all the creatures of the forest, great and small. He can be counted on when planning and organization is needed, though his plans not infrequently have holes he overlooks, blinded by his own inspiring genius. He struggles with change and is slow to embrace new people or places in his life. Plus, he likes his carrots raw.
I've never been a big Winnie the Pooh guy - I never understood the appeal of Tigger, or the strange obsessions with Piglet - but when a friend says you remind her of a cartoon character, you take a closer look. Twenty years later, I have to confess, she might have had a point.