Part IV Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

The footsteps that Alice heard pattering were not those of the mouse. Rather, they belonged to the White Rabbit who was muttering to himself about the Duchess executing him for he could not find his fan and gloves. When he sees Alice he calls her MaryAnn and commands her to go home at once and fetch his gloves and fan. Now Alice, who had lastly shrunk from holding the Rabbit’s fan, runs off in fear to try to find his fan and gloves. (What a turn of events. First Alice pursues the White Rabbit down a hole and now the White Rabbit is telling Alice what to do. My, but we should be careful what we chase after.) Soon she comes to a house with a brass plate which reads W Rabbit. She doesn’t even knock but runs in and upstairs to try to locate these items before the housemaid, that she supposes is MaryAnn, finds her and puts her out of the house.

There on the table near the window are several pairs of white gloves and the fan. And in the same room, near the looking glass, is a bottle with a stopper and no label which she can’t resist drinking. Poor Alice grows so large that her head hits the ceiling and her arm sticks out the window and a foot goes up the chimney. For a moment she regrets going down the rabbit hole. This regret is soon replaced by her curiosity with all these adventures and she vows she will write a book about herself when she grows up…only to face the fact that she is already grown up. (What about all of our plans, goals and resolutions to do this and that when we grow up only to find out one day that we are grown up and haven’t yet achieved those longings?)
The White Rabbit’s failed attempts to enter his house set off a round of actions and reactions with Alice swiping at him with her arm and hearing the shattering of glass as the Rabbit crashes into a cucumber frame or ‘something of the sort’. This incident sets off a chain of events. Bill the lizard is enlisted to go down the chimney only to be kicked out ‘like a skyrocket’ by Alice’s foot and into the yard. Next the rabbit threatens to burn down the house but Alice counters by saying she will ‘set Dinah’ at them. Finally, they send pebbles in the window and some hit her in the face. Alice notices that the pebbles are turning into little cakes.
Oh! Little cakes. Yes, you guessed it. Alice eats one and she shrinks again, runs out of the house, away from the awaiting animals and into the woods. Her plan is to ‘grow to her right size again’ and to ‘find her way’ into the beautiful garden. The problem with the plan is she doesn’t have the slightest idea how to accomplish it. (Can you identify with Alice? Have you ever experienced this? You have a plan but you just don’t know how to execute it?)
After an encounter and a fearful adventure with an enormous puppy, she escapes and runs off. Leaning against a buttercup, her thoughts turn to knowing she must grow up. She just doesn’t know what to eat or drink to grow up. She looks at the surrounding flowers and grass but does not see the right thing to eat or drink. Next she finds a mushroom and stretches on tiptoe to see what is on top of it. What she finds sitting on the mushroom will have to wait until next time.