Mon 19 Jun 2006
I had a lot to think about today. My little boy who is now five and deep into his adventurous imagination fills me with pride and a keen and sweet remembrance on the small boy that I perhaps once was. With his “ho-hooongh! Avast yer scurvy Pirate!” or his Potteresque “rengaurdium leviosa!” I remember similar pasionate mimicry for spiderman, St. George (cave! Sic Dragones!), Robin Hood (and his rocket bound analog) and of course, the below showcased, Hercules. Olympiaaaa!
It is not just a good time for a laugh at the past. It is also Father’s day and this is a day that occasions much thought. Solomon was with me this weekend and for that I am thankful. We played, worked on holding a pen and making letters, had a lesson in dog training, visited a toy train store near the corner of Carnarvon and 6th street in New Westminster where we had a lesson in economy, and we played outside under the very trees I played under when I was a boy. The whole thing got me to think about my Dad a lot.
He is in Russia learning how to paint. St. Petersburg has the l’Hermitage museum and a bunch of painters that tell old dudes from Washington State how to paint like you need the money. I remember him today because in my son I see the same convinced passion about imaginative play that I remember in myself. It is a type of play that is both hilarious to the outside observer and truly serious to the “inside eyes” of the little boy.
I remember not really believing that I was doing battle with the Sheriff of Nottingham but that the idea of the battle and the forces (bravery, justice, history) at play were important and real. I had to try them on, like armor (or a blue toga) to see how they fit. My seriousness, and now my son’s can’t be laughed off. I don’t have the answers but I know that it is formative. So much of this play for little boys is verboten today, often by well meaning caregivers and teachers that can not tell that the outward pantomime of aggression is actually a minute examination on the qualities of mercy and the difference between right and wrong.
I give my son free rein (mostly) with this, as I was afforded by my parents. While he plays under the same canopy as I once did, and as my father also played (and as it happens in the same hobby store where my father shopped as a kid) I remember this continuity. It is comforting, but I often feel as if I am parenting from another age.
Time will tell.
So much of this play for little boys is verboten today, often by well meaning caregivers and teachers that can not tell that the outward pantomime of aggression is actually a minute examination on the qualities of mercy and the difference between right and wrong.
Well said, young man! While things can (and often do) get out of hand with kids experimenting with such things, it strikes me that without such experimental and assumedly “aggressive” play, kids don’t have a chance to figure out the boundaries of acceptibility in the no-pressure situation of backyard swashbuckling. When they get all rough-and-tumble and hear shrieks of despair, it’s an easy connection to make between the “let’s give my playmate a headlock” thought and the “oh, I guess that hurts my playmate” thought before such an act becomes a prosecutable offense.
The difficulty now is that parents/teachers/busybodies are swept up with examining that hazy line between childhood roughhousing and “bullying.” For sure, it happens - whether we can do anything about it as the grownups, and whether it warrants an all-out ban on childhood play to prevent such acts is debatable.
It’s just like puppies! They throw themselves upon each other when they’re too weak to do any real damage so that they learn how hard is to hard to bite by the time they’re powerful adults. Puppies bite and wrestle with each other, but when one ball of fluff sinks its needle teeth too deeply in another’s skin, the aggrieved one yelps and turns away, ignoring the aggressor for a time. The puppy eventually learns the boundaries of acceptable roughhousing, and that playing nicely means its playmates will stick around. It’s an important lesson in self-control.
Um, Ya, Puppies.
The world would be a very small place for a child that is not encouraged to “imagineer” through play. I remember a little boy who could see so many fascinating things from his “inside eye” and play them out to the entertainment of many. That little boy also understood the values of human kindness and tolerance for the ideas of others.