In pondering what theme to pick for today’s post I considered a number of options ranging from charity to calypso but in the end I decided to settle on a childhood (and adult) favorite.. C is for Cookie.
Of course we all know this from Sesame Street and I think we all still enjoy humming the tune to ourselves but I wanted to take things an extra step.
When we look back at childhood one of the things most of us remember is a feeling of contentment, security and in general happiness. Our biggest concern was what kind of snack we’d get after school and whether or not that cool new cartoon would be on again.
We played games and had fun, whether we won or lost. Losing wasn’t fun but we came to understand that it was part of life and we were able to focus on the joy of play. We didn’t have the same wall to wall media coverage either. We looked forward to the adventure of seeing that special movie once a year and that made it even more magic.
I worry about children of today and whether they will have such adventures.
Will they be able to learn about winning and losing in the same way when we adults try to make every game a tie ?
I’m not saying that we can’t try to make childhood a little easier on the next generations or that we shouldn’t show more sensitivity for the less athletic or the “nerd” of the group.
But at the same time I think there is something to be said for an era where we don’t need to have ties because the children are innocent and genuine enough to not care. Yes the world is different but we should let kids be kids.
Take a child to the park and just let them play like we did in the old days.
Take away their (and your) electronics for an evening or a weekend so you can enjoy life.
Let them lose a game but then show them that life goes on.
Show them the silly old cartoons and shows we used to watch and let them learn they are pretty cool.
And taking the thought in reverse I think there is something to be said for we adults to take a page from the children. While things have perhaps changed they still retain a level of innocence and purity of joy.
Why can’t we do that too ?
Take an afternoon off and go grab an ice cream cone.
Sit back with some kids and watch a silly movie.
Laugh out loud in public and not care if people stare.
Wear your Disney shirts with pride.
And feel free to suggest other ways for adults to live as kids (or how we can keep kids as kids too)
And to sum up this post I offer an example of an adult enjoying a bit of childhood, and it wraps up the title pretty well too