A Leopard Can Change its Spots

In the jungle, there is one thing that all the animals read; Vague – the greatest, animal fashion magazine in the world.

Each month, its front cover shows what the best-dressed and most fashionable animal is wearing. On the day it comes out, all the animals fall quiet as they flock round to devour the photographs and articles.

All that is, except Anabelle the Leopard. She just wasn’t interested in fashion at all and was very happy being exactly the way she was.

Then, one day, as Anabelle was walking through the jungle, saying good morning to all the other animals, a copy of Vague blew under her paw. It was the February issue and on the cover was a Zebra.

“Oooh,” said the Macaws to Anabelle, “you would look so good in that!”

Suddenly Annabelle began to wonder what she would look like with stripes. “Perhaps I would look better” she thought. As she stared at her own fur, she began to see how uneven her spots were and that there wasn’t really a proper pattern.

As she gazed at the stripes, she thought, “I don’t look as pretty as that Zebra and those stripes are so thinning. I think I should change the way I look so that I am more fashionable and then I will be happier and the other animals will like me more”

Now, if you are a Leopard, there is one easy way to get inside someone else’s skin.

And so, with a growl and a leap and a gnashing of teeth, Anabelle was wearing a Zebra coat...

As she paraded through the jungle, she waited for all the other animals to whistle and shout their appreciation. But they didn’t. In fact, the Monkeys howled at her and the Hyenas laughed until they were hoarse.

Anabelle couldn’t understand what was wrong – she was wearing the most fashionable skin, surely she must look lovely?

In March, the front cover was Parrot. Anabelle looked at the picture with envy – wouldn’t she look good in all wonderful those colours? Maybe it was just stripes that didn’t suit her and anything was better than her tatty spots.

And so, with a growl and a leap and a gnashing of teeth, Anabelle was wearing a Parrot’s plumage.

But no one said she looked lovely. In fact, many of the animals just ran away and hid…

In April a Crocodile was on the cover. “OOOOOh”, thought Anabelle, “I would look so good in that! Feathers were such a ridiculous idea for a figure like mine.’

And so, with a growl and a leap and a gnashing of teeth, Anabelle was wearing a Crocodile’s skin…

In May, June, July, August, September, October and November the same thing happened as Anabelle wore the front cover.

In the jungle, all Anabelle’s friends had started avoiding her because she frightened them but silly Anabelle thought is was because they didn’t like the way she looked. She got more and more worried about her appearance and felt more and more unhappy.

When the December issue was published, Anabelle didn’t even bother to look at a copy. She just knew she was never going to look fashionable. She just lay on a branch feeling very, very sad.

But then, strange things started happening…

Her friends and other animals started coming up to her and saying how good she looked. At first they were nervous but, once they realised that Anabelle wasn’t going to take their skins, they got closer and closer, just like they used to.

Anabelle was confused. Here she was, in her spotty fur and suddenly everyone was saying how fashionable she was!?!

Then she saw it - the cover of Vague. The headline read ‘SPOTS - the fashion for next year!’

Anabelle just didn’t know what to think. Half of her was really pleased to be seen as fashionable but the other half was angry. Why did she need someone else to tell her she looked good?

Then she remembered back to a year before when she didn’t follow fashion. Back then, all the animals had been her friends and she was happy. She didn’t even think about how she looked, it was how she felt that was important, and she had felt happy.

Finally, she spoke;

“Thank you for saying I look pretty and it is nice to hear but what is more important is how I feel about how I look. For a whole year I have tried to look and feel like someone else in the hope of being fashionable. It has taken me a year of being sad to realise that I was, and should be, happy just being me.

I never want to see Vague  Spots, stripes, feathers, fur, skin, red, yellow, green, blue and black doesn’t matter – it’s how you feel inside that’s important and nobody should tell you otherwise.”

So some of us are big and some of us are small,

Some of us are very short and some of us are tall.

That some of us are grey and some of us are pink,

Should make us want to celebrate and should have made me think

That although some of us have feathers and some of us have hide,

It’s not what’s on outside counts but how you feel inside.

From today, I shall be happy in my own skin and with how I look and I will not care what other people might say and I hope you will be the same.”

I know now that a Leopard can change it’s spots – but I would much rather not!”

And, with that, all the animals let out a big cheer and threw their copies of Vague to the ground where Shrews went about tearing them to shreds.

“Ooh” said one Shrew to another “I’ve heard Vague nests are sooooo this season!”…